Comments - JigsawPieces

It is a bit, huh! Actually, this project reminded me of (and caused me to draw a lot of inspiration from) FFIX's environments.

And yeah, I still render with Blender Internal since my old GPU isn't supported... This isn't a raw render though; I did adjustments in Photoshop: I.4cdn.org

Thanks! It's much easier having as many polys to work with as you want. I have more interesting stuff to upload soon too... (I always forget about mod/indiedb nowadays >.>)

Well, at least they closed the door on the way out... for some reason...

Don't think to hard about it.

I've actually never played it :-( Someone I was working with said they'd like the project to use that sort of art, so I used some art they linked me to as a reference and tried recreating it.

After that project fell through I decided to only do paid work for others and develop my own ideas on the side.

Ah, I see. That was the whole point of the mod -- it was a total conversion and had nothing to do with Fallout.

It's been a long time since I've fiddled with the GECK properly, but I'm pretty sure the stuff determining where you start resides in a few script lines in cg00. If you open the GECK, search for cg00 (make sure you're searching everything), then right click it, choose edit and look through the tabs until you find some code referencing the start locations. It'll be something like "set player start location to ff7startmarker" (I can't remember exactly what it was!) That's a place to begin looking anyway; I can't guarantee that'll hold the answers though.

If you manage to start your game in the Wasteland with the mod loaded, COCing is easy, you just need to know the cell name. Everything in the mod begins with "ff7", so just search for that in the GECK for cell, object, character, etc names. There's tutorials for setting up doors between different areas.

That's about all I know off the top of my head. Hope that helps.

I'm not sure what you mean by "auto-teleport"; perhaps if you explain what you mean by that I'll be able to help.

It's not for anything. I was gonna make a blueprint of something but then got bored with the tutorial and made something totally different :D

So many curves!

This is pretty good for early music. Better than some of the atrocious things from my past :D

Unfortunately, Freestyle doesn't :D It won't render the line art at higher resolutions, which is lame...

Thanks. The top part was surprisingly hard to make D-:

Thanks, glad you like it.

Apparently Palmer can't afford any more of that "lard" he was so fond of.

Way to compliment the one thing I didn't make :D

*one month later*

I dunno... I think it was just Photoshop filters XD The painting part is from an image I got off the net though.

Thanks :)

I notated it by hand in Guitar Pro 5. I wrote part of it on my keyboard, but I rarely record with it since it's usually just as quick (and more organised for me) to notate it. Then I imported the midi file into Cubase and applied the nice virtual instruments.

Actually, I wrote the percussion parts (minus the timpani) in Cubase too, kind of spur of the moment. Cubase, FL, etc. all have crap ways of notating, in my opinion. I prefer being able to see the score with the staffs.

It was a visual novel dev team. You know, visual novels. The text games with sprites where the main character, a player surrogate, stalks a load of under-age girls in a utopian Japanese high school. Or something.

I joined as a composer, but became the background artist as well. The BGs were to be 3D renders which were then embellished by the other artists. Later, I also became somewhat of a manager.

I left last week, however. For more details, come online and we'll chat - according to Pidgin, you're the one who hasn't been online for ages!

I wouldn't say "upgraded" so much as acquiesced to the norm of a dev team I joined. But I am well as you apparently are too ^.^

Also, these look nice.

I use Skype! I got tired of having both Skype and Pidgin open :D

Brum brum! Wait, I mean, choo choo!

Just a small update of what I'm putting together for v0.3:
Youtube.com
I365.photobucket.com

I'll release the 'full' mod here, as well as on the FO3 nexus. I'll notify the guys over at qhimm when I do. I occasionally post over there anyway, my username is 'Tempus' there.

"This is about doing what you care about"

Partly. If it were exclusively for me there'd be no problem. However, I was developing for myself and other fans. Moddb and nexus sites are how people find out about the mod, it's where media is shared and that generates the majority of new followers. I would not be able to have communication with the fans either because doing so would be to admit disobeying the C&D order, an illegal act. Secondly, I'd never be able to show my years worth of work to prospective (game dev) employers, because they (the employers) would then know that I continued development even after being legally required to cease, something employers are very unlikely to impressed by. It would also make me a liability to them if they were to hire me.

I don't think the "screw IP laws" attitude is the right way to go about things here. I see two broad options: either get permission to develop or evade IP laws and sacrifice 80-90% of the audience (in addition to other things). To me, the latter option would be incredibly bitter and disheartening. It's enough work developing without having to worry about illegal distribution. As I said in the original post, given the immense amount of time I was pouring into the mod or related endeavours (often hours per day) I really didn't want that to go to waste. Ultimately I decided I should be working on a project that I was in control of.

There was another paragraph I tried to add to my previous comment, but it was after the 5 minute edit limit. I can't remember the content, but it was basically concerned with explaining that I do care about the project. In some ways the project is intimately tied up with my own personal life and many of the rites of passage I've experienced were while I was developing for the mod. I really love the setting of FFVII (particularly Midgar), the feel, and its aesthetic, and I did enjoy developing for it. Sometimes you just have to let stuff go and it really sucks.

Anyone who takes over will likely be alone and need to shoulder all the same responsibilities I (and the developer before me) did. It's unlikely that someone who knows nothing about the base game / editor (FO3/GECK) will be able to find others who will put their assets in game for them. Even if they did, it's very inefficient workflow. You'll either need to learn it for yourself or it will never get done, a lesson I repeatedly learned throughout my development time. Fortunately, there's a lot of FO3 art pipeline tutorials (from 3D app > ingame). My personal advice would not be to wait for someone else to come along and fulfil role X and learn it.

But anyhow, I hope things go well. As noted elsewhere, more resources will be released to be freely used how you or others see fit. Good luck.

Oh, and I checked the Mako Dawn forums and couldn't see anyone named 'Stigma', are you sure that's what you meant?

"Personally think that they merely ignored your email because they don't care about this."

Yeah, I also think it's likely the email was ignored, regardless of whether it was read. I don't, however, think that means they're okay with it. I'm of the opinion that given the multitude of start-up fan works they don't bother C&Ding projects until they look like they're actually going to be completed. I certainly didn't want to find out if that were true or not after investing hundreds of man hours into the mod.

I'll be releasing the rest of the resources soon. People can still play around with stuff, it only requires some basic knowledge of the GECK.

I see what you did there!

I did, I put a crate in there before this :D That, and a wooden sphere!

This looks great.