Blogs - GeneralJ927

If you play any of the MoW series games and do mods for the game, you may know thats i'm doing sets of 3ds max export tutorial videos, which help people get their models and stuff into the game.

Well i'm finally coming to release the second set, which is tanks, which have been delayed due to my ISP doing upgrade work, which has severely affected my internet connection, so i expect to get these up with the max timeframe of next week (or i'm going to be a sad panda...with a bit of anger).

With the amount of stuff thats in the set of tank tutorials, i've managed to fill 5 pages of writing with all the stuff thats goes into it (compared to 1 page for the weapon export), i will be doing bonus tank tutorials filling in the extra stuff, such as AA MG's and multi-cannon tanks, which would extend the pages to about 7 or even 8. The amount of work thats goes into getting these ready is alot....i mean alot, when i did my LVT-4 i had to do some trial and error, which some was a really pain in the behind, but with these tutorials, you will be getting it easy and a breeze.

What to expect, this is a quick rundown, these are all crammed into 7 parts:

1 Basis - (dummy object box that is required)
2 Textures - (i will also be adding normal map and specular map)
3 Tank Tracks - (The way its meant to be made, hard but the easier way)
4 Structure Linking - (linking all the pieces correctly)
5 Object Properties - (extra info)
6 Inverse Kinematics - (makes the engine know what moves, like the turret)
7 Point Helpers - (foresight (aiming), lights and a few extras)
8 Visors - (lets the tank see)
9 Volumes - (includes the new Polyhedron Convex Hull Mesh)
10 ID/Smoothing Groups Tagging - (helps the engine with the armour values)
11 Emiters - (helps the AI know where to enter a vehicle)
12 Seats - (helps the AI know where it can sit or be on a vehicle)
13 Animations - (give it movement and how to get them in-game correctly)
14 Exporting Process - (from 3ds max to the game)
15 Files - (get it working in-game)
16 Coding - (getting animations and lights to work, also a few extras)

So as you can see, alot of hard work for me, with these tutorials, far easier for you, if you learned this my way, it would take 1-2 weeks for you to get everything perfect, with these, possibly a day or two, so i hope people will enjoy these and be happy (i know the Men of the Emperor mod team will be). :-)

Thats my little talk over, back to what i do best and thats more work.

Me, myself and I along with many others, hate nothing more than looking at a mod and thinking its interesting, then clicking on it to find its crammed full of content from real games or other legitimate mods, but although you look around the page, you find no words saying they actually got written permission from the original makers to use the content, at this point i class them as illegal mods (piracy mods).

If you sit there and think of an idea, then say "I know, i'll make a modern warfare mod", but then you say "my skills in 3d modelling are non-existent, and would take along time to make them myself, i know i'll take content from a modern warfare game i have here". You will then possibly look at ARMA 2, find tools to get your hands on the models from the game and then proceed to convert them to the game you want to make your mod for.

During this you may have thought/or even not thought about asking the developers if you could use this content, possibly thinking it will take too long and want to get started, or possibly afraid of being refused permission, so there you are making this mod with stolen content, which automatically classes your mod as illegal.

I've seen many people say "The worst is the mod will get closed down, but they will just make another and another", but have you ever thought why the mods get closed down, this is to protect you, as the company could come after you with the legal bat.

If the ARMA 2 devs came strolling around looking at mods coming out, then see yours with their content in, but they have no record of you getting permission, theres many options they can go with:

(1)-the lesser is asking you if its for personnal use or whether you are intending to ask for permission to use that content, which can lead to the next one

(2)-the most common one is they will contact the site and get the mod and you removed from it, then this can be taken a step further

(3)-the greater one which they protect you from is the legal side, many people don't even realize this one, when the company sees a little benefit, this is where you can really soil your pants in fear, as this way they can sue you and possibly get some monetary value from you, possibly even get you imprisonment, this seems a more likely option with more companies and governments getting fed up with piracy.

Many can get away with it and release their mods, then other people get the content from that mod and before you know it, theres a chain of them using the same stolen content. You may think your in the clear, but you'll be leaving a trail and can come to get you far into the future.

So the end of the story is, if your going to make mods, atleast make the content yourself or gain it the right way, thats either getting permission or whether you can use it, then you'll know the legal bat is never going to whack you across the head. For me i can make a model in a day if needed and have it funtioning, i even go and ask for permission to use stuff, so why can't YOU! do the same?