10 replies to this topic

[sionic]

I was bored after I played UFO lately and made a couple of UFOpedias:

You can now download them all as EXEs

Main page & Search
X-COM UFO Defense UFOPEDIA [EXE]
X-COM Terror from the deep UFOPEDIA [EXE]
X-COM Apocalypse UFOPEDIA [EXE]

There's an index page where you can browse all the images, the intermediate category pages and because I was really, really bored I even made it so that you can browse through the entries with your arrow keys.

I want to make a similar ufopedia for Apocalypse as there doesn't seem to be one out there, but I'm having trouble capturing from Apocalypse, if anyone can supply me with the completed ufopedia images from Apocalypse I'll code it up.

Also if anyone has any suggestions on how I might improve them I'll give it a go.

Edit: cleaned up this post.

Edited by sionic, 30 March 2010 - 06:48 PM.

[kafros]

That looks/works great sionic!!!

Buttons for x1, x1.5, x2 view would be a wonderful addition. Unfortunately, I don't know of any Apocalypse-ufopedia site (at least, one that's still working) except from http://www.ufopaedia...itle=Apocalypse. Maybe Zombie knows...?

Once again, wonderful work

Edited by kafros, 10 March 2010 - 10:18 AM.

[sionic]

Thanks, I thought about doing a zoom function but thought it might be a little difficult, I've had a little think and I think there are few easy-ish ways to do it.

Also I've just this minute found all of the Apoc images, they were hiding in plain sight on my backup drive from when I ripped them back in 2004, will be getting the apocapedia online soon.

Edited by sionic, 10 March 2010 - 05:43 PM.

[sionic]

OK, so it didn't take as long as I thought even though I had to reconvert and rename the original files again because I stupidly put them as JPG before... ewww... Thank god for xNview.

X-COM Apocalypse UFOPEDIA

Hopefully it should be working ok, let me know if you ave any problems with it.

Notes: I have not followed precisely the way it works in Apoc, I didn't like the way that pressing right at the end of a category took you to the beginning of that category, so now it takes you to the next category. Do you think this is ok or should I emulate the in-game one precisely?

Also I have not yet implemented the info button because I do not have the screen grabs of those menu pages, even if/when I do get those pages it may not be easy to implement but I will try. So this time I'll ask, does anyone have a save game with a complete UFOpedia for Apocalypse or could screen cap me the info pages? Then I can complete the ufopedia in full.

Secondly I upgraded the UFO & USOPEDIA a little more by making each individual item link back to the category menu intead of the main menu, I also fixed a few PNG gamma issues.

Edit: Still been hard at work on all of them, have now made sure each page has the right title and have also implemented a search function on the UFO Defense UFOpedia, will be adding this to all of the ufopedias soon.

Edited by sionic, 12 March 2010 - 07:07 PM.

[KayDat]

You could probably have a centralised page leading to each individual paedia when you exit them respectively. Would make navigating somewhat easier. Also, the info list in Apoc isn't an image. You could just make a grey frame of sorts as a background, and just have the list on top, using some script for scrolling. You can use any of the Apoc editors out there, Xed (DOS) or Midnight (Windows) to show all UFOpaedia. Might be hard finding the font used though.

[sionic]

Thanks for the suggestions on the editors, having a bit of trouble getting some of them to work under windows 7, hopefully I'll get time to do some more updates this weekend and thanks for the idea for a centralised page, never really considered it

[KayDat]

XeD is DOS based, so you'll need Dosbox. How are you running X-Com Apoc right now anyway? If you already have Dosbox, just plonk XeD in the same folder, and run it from there. Midnight editor should run fine off the bat, without even altering compatibility settings.; I've been using Win7 since the RC, and most apps I've found work pretty okay.

Edit: BTW, the heading font used in Apoc is called Reticulan IIRC. Again, not sure what font is used in the body of the game though.

Edited by KayDat, 17 March 2010 - 09:29 PM.

[sionic]

Thanks for the info again, been running through dosbox but it's the version from steam so not sure what it's actually running... I'll give XED a try I haven't used that one yet.

[sionic]

Have spent a good while finishing off the sites, they now look a little different, work a lot smoother behind the scenes and hopefully are more user friendly.

Also made a central page to avoid confusion: http://ufopedia.csignal.org/ - I'll probably make it look a little better in the next few days.

OK buttons on all the UFOpedias lead back to it now.

EDIT: OK, so I finished the visual look of all the UFOpedias and then moved them to a different domain, I also changed about the main page and added a search box to search all of the ufopedia from one place

Please let me know if you have a problem with the search not working, I had a conflict with the search script and google analytics.

Edited by sionic, 23 March 2010 - 04:23 PM.

[3llense'g]

Such a useful and well done resource. Thanks!

[sionic]

Every time I think I've finished coding the site I think of another little thing to add. Have added autocomplete to the main page search and also added a few more little tweaks. Still in the process of transcribing the text for all of them to make a more advanced search page.

EDIT: I'm so obsessed I've now compiled the UFOpedias into EXEs, see the first post for links, links are also on the UFOpedia pages.

Edited by sionic, 30 March 2010 - 06:53 PM.