? ART-Model Concepts

[Vaaish]

A hastily set up organization sent to deal with a vastly techmologically superior enemy will use whatever tools are available. black projects aren't in full scale production an sending one or two prototypes isn't exactally the best way to deal with a threat especially when you don't know how they perform. You can't use a weapon that isn't there available no matter how high tech the gadget is.

 

Now as the game progresses I would suspect that the YF23 would be phased out by the player in favor of the more advanced craft.

 

Watch ID4 to see what I mean, yeah a black project might be in the works but what do you tell the aliens that are attacking now? Come back in a few months when we can fight you?

 

The best tech available might just be the YF23 for the start of the game.

[Breunor]

I agree with Vaaish on that. It's true that there may be better planes in development, but how many are there? The interceptor is pretty pathetic in the game, 1 on 1 it only stnads a chance against the smaller ufo classes. Was it the F-15 that was used as the interceptor in the original version? It was pretty old at the time.

 

Here's a nice option for a more futuristic craft. It's advanced, remotely piloted (which could play into the interceptor window nicely), and since it has already been flown in the mid 90s we could say it has continued development and has finally reached production when the aliens arrive. Whatever company that produces them could be stopped from shipping to the original buyers and redirected to help your agency instead. Since it hasn't been flown at full scale, there's plenty of leeway as to the specs it would have.

 

Another thought is that the YF-22 was put into production due to cost, but the YF-23 was also developed secretly, for use is covert ops. When the threat arrives, the YF-23 is provided with the most advanced tech available, and outperforms anything else is standard military use.

Edited June 7, 2003 by Breunor

[j'ordos]

I like that idea of having scientists all over the world, working independently from x-com, developing new or improved weapons you can purchase in stead of the standard equipment. So after a while you could buy better missiles, interceptors, rifles, armour,... Not quite of the same level as alien stuff but an improvement nonetheless.

[Deimos]

The first thing that springs to mind is cost effectiveness. It's quite easy to build the fastest, most manueverable highest tech plane that has state of the art electronics, but there is no way you'd get change from $1/2 billion.

 

The F23 is the best design at the right price. We have to take into consideration that a black projects craft just won't have the infrastructure behind it to keep it in the air. Just like the militaries of the world are 'still' using, in the case of the US the F16, the FA18, F15 and the A10 warthog. not becasue they're the best money can buy, but because they have the support in place to keep them in the air. Prototype craft just don't have that backup.

[Guest drewid]

also don't forget we want the first craft and weapons to be contemporary tech, not future tech, to help draw the player in. Second generation tech gets funkier

[Breunor]

Very true. So our best best is to use the YF-23 design, and we can say "special modifications" are done to make it the best plane for the right price.

 

And then there's the fact that we have it modeled and textured as well, that's also a good selling point.

 

For v1+, we are considering an option where multiple plane designs are avilable to pick from. At that point, you could make as many models as you like, or just replace the YF-23 with a different design. In either case, you get the design you want.

[Guest Jim69]

Fair enough, im convinced.

 

Are there ne concepts of the ufo's being made? From what little information I've seen on the net they seem to be made up of a large disk with a dome in the centre. Are they gonna be modelled on this kind of design, or a more organic type like those seen in Apocalypse?

[Guest drewid]

Still at early sketch stage really.

There's some stuff in this thread:

 

http://www.xcomufo.com/forums//index.php?a...=43&t=992&st=35

 

(How do you do that short link thing breunor?)

 

We want to keep the floorplans similar to the original, outside they will have an iridium sheen texture, they might be faceted, or more likely lots of smooth curves, (shows off the texture and forms more of a contrast to the more angular human designs).

[Deimos]

Like Drewid said we've done some preliminary concepts for the ufo's. However having said that as the UFO's primary function is for theplayer to assault, they should be designed from a tactical viewpoint rather than an aesthetic one. See my thread on ufo design.

[Breunor]

The first thread on ufo design can be found here. As Deimos mentioned, we want the tactical aspect to take priority, function over form. That being said, it's easy enough to make a nice skin over the floorplans that are developed. So you can still make outer designs so long as you realise they'le have to be stretched to fit. It would be best if we focused on developing those floorplans first though.

 

I'm guessing you mean short links like the one above Drewid? When posting a link, as you know you hit the http button, and insert the hyperlink in the first prompt. The second prompt allows you to put what you want to show in the message. So the first prompt was given "http://www.xcomufo.com/forums//index.php?act=ST&f=43&t=992" and the second prompt was given "here."

[Kenshiro]

An aside: A defense contractor uncle of mine used to be a Electronic Warfare officer and plays golf with some executive-level personnel in the Air Force who he used to fly with on a routine basis. He got good intel that the Air Force determined that the Northrop ATF project was superior in more than a few ways and had far fewer problems on the way to development, but certain Senators on the Arms Committee were more interested in the state where it would be produced than in the performance specs. A bit of research might show a surprising coincidence between where the components of the F-22 are being built and the home states of the serving Arms Committee members.

 

Incidentally although the YF-23's pricetag was stated slightly higher per copy at decision time, the F-22 turned out to be more expensive in the end (nearly twice the quoted price) because all the design retrofits that had to take place after the contract was awarded to the Lockheed-Boeing-Gen Dynamics team. Gotta love politics.

 

Edited July 8, 2003 by Kenshiro

[Breunor]

Ah, any price is acceptable for xeno-craft! We just skin it to have corporate logos on the wings, for the advertising subsidies! This missile brought to you by McDonalds...

[Guest drewid]

Ah, any price is acceptable for xeno-craft! We just skin it to have corporate logos on the wings, for the advertising subsidies! This missile brought to you by McDonalds...

someone sent me this

[mikker]

, if you decorate your crafts like that, you could get an additional 1.000.000 each year! ::

[miceless]

, if you decorate your crafts like that, you could get an additional 1.000.000 each year!  ::

You could hire marketing people to try and find you all sorts of advertising contracts. Put them in along with the Scientists and Engineers.

[Breunor]

A great idea, until marketing tries to sell it... "well, we can't tell you how we'd promote your products, it's top secret. No, nobody but the aliens would see it, and we'd be killing them anyway. Why should you pay us for that? That sounds like you're under ALIEN CONTROL! Kill them!"

[mikker]

Sounds good, but its V 1.0+ though

[miceless]

Sounds good, but its V 1.0+ though 

IS there actually anything in v1.0? Seems everything is v1.0+

 

[Vaaish]

whatever was in Xcom UFO defense is 1.0 xenicide

[Guest Jim69]

Yeah, the way I have seen things is like V1.0 is X-Com UFO in 3D with as many bugs that can be crushed as possible, then some stuff from the lab will gradually be included as it is tested.

[miceless]

:: I was only joking!

[Guest Jim69]

Oooh, u sucked me in good, damn

[miceless]

I was just joking about the fact that everything we talk about is v1.0+

 

It has to be as the idea of v1.0 is, as Jim69 says, xcom1 minus the bugs (pretty much). I was just attempting to be funny, but obviously it was either very bad, or beyond people. I thought the smilies would give it away. I had not expected two serious replies.

[Guest Jim69]

, i realised that now but I was pretty wasted at the time and didn't c the smilies

[miceless]

hehe, no probs. vaaish thought i was serious too it seems.

[Breunor]

X-Wing Red Leader: "Stay on topic, stay on topic..."

2 Tie Interceptors, piloted by Jim69 and Miceless, swoop in behind Red Leader.

Red Leader: "AHHHH!!!!"

 

Not like I'm helping much...

[Guest Jim69]

, I had to go 2 the 9th of June to actually find an on topic post, oops

 

Back 2 my question I asked and then forgot about: I understand that the UFO's will be modelled in accordance to tactics, but 4 the shells: Are they still gonna be using that irridum sheen effect, or an organic type like in Apoc? I only ask coz I haven't actually heard about ne1 giving an opinion on this, or even mentioning irridum sheen l8tely.

[Kenshiro]

So, has anyone posted a concept model for the ufos yet? It seemed like the layout folks had come to a few conclusions on the interiors. I think this would have dual use in the X-Net which is scheduled to be up and running within 2 weeks.

 

*Adopts Ben Stein monotone*

Anyone?... Anyone?

[Breunor]

Jim69: yes.

Kenshiro: yes.

 

Oh, you want more?

 

We are using the iridium sheen effect for the ufo hulls, as well as the faceted look. Drewid and I had posted some concept shots for ufo design previously, mine was just for a small scout class (1 room interior), while his was for a big battleship. They should be in the ufo design thread in the battlescape forum. The hull designs have 2 parts IMO: overall cool look as well as functional game mechanics. The first is easy enough. The second requires the hulls be designed using modular parts that can be destroyed a piece at a time. This is assuming you could destroy the hull using a blaster bomb or something. The other part is making those chunks look decent when you go from cool exterior to tactical interior. I think there has to be an extra hull area or empty space to fill in the gaps of the interior floor plans and the smooth design lines we'd expect the ufo to have. That should be easy enough to do. So once we have an idea about the interior space used, we can desing the hull around that. For example, there should be a fixed maximum size for a supply ship interior, that we know will fit into the hull design.

[Guest drewid]

There's some stuff in here. There are some unsolved hangover problems to do with how to break up a hull into 1 x 1 x 2.5m blocks.

 

The hulls are facted ATM, but we should try smoothed as well to see what it looks like.

 

Personally I like the asymmetrical accidental cluster thing.

[Deimos]

I was thinking, instead of using the faceted effect we could use one of the ideas one of the CTD guys came up with. That was that alien alloys are grown. Now if we used Crix Dorius's environment and bump maps he used for the lightining, it'd all fit in together and along with the iridium sheen we'd get a uniform 'grown' look to everything that uses alien alloys.

 

What do you guys think?

 

For anyone who can't remember what it looks like I've included a pic. Ok its a wip for an animation I'm doing but it does the trick

[Vaaish]

I was thinking, instead of using the faceted effect we could use one of the ideas one of the CTD guys came up with. That was that alien alloys are grown. Now if we used Crix Dorius's environment and bump maps he used for the lightining, it'd all fit in together and along with the iridium sheen we'd get a uniform 'grown' look to everything that uses alien alloys.

 

What do you guys think?

 

For anyone who can't remember what it looks like I've included a pic. Ok its a wip for an animation I'm doing but it does the trick

That would be a pain on things like the armor models having all these edges. do you think that it might be that individual components are grown like a hull plate or piece of armor in the shape they need to be so some could be single objects and smooth and others faceted sheets?

[Guest Jim69]

Couldn't the edges be created in the same way as that thing in Doom 3's textures, making the appearence of more poly's than there already is using some kinda polybump?, I think this is already been discussed but I never remember an outcome.

[Deimos]

That would be a pain on things like the armor models having all these edges. do you think that it might be that individual components are grown like a hull plate or piece of armor in the shape they need to be so some could be single objects and smooth and others faceted sheets?

I reckon we could get away with growing individual smaller pieces for the armour, but the detail in the pic above is from a texture and a bump map so there aren't really any more polys needed on the model.

 

It depends on how much detail we can see once its in BS but I reckon for x-net we should ramp up as much detail as we can. Even if we don't use the grown look for the armour.

 

BTW the anim for the suit rocks.

[hippyjon]

hmm, makes sence to have a different look for the alien hulls, we should probably avoid using the sheen look to much, or itll look uniform. it could do with looking more detailed, like smaller sploges, more smuged together (i know its early concept stuff like...)

[miceless]

Wow. I really like the 'grown' look that Demois showed above. I think it makes it better than the good ol' metal sheen look.

[Breunor]

I think using that texture for the hulls would work great, including the sheen. On the armor, I wouldn't use it, just say each part of the armor is an entire piece of the alloy and use the sheen alone there. You could make parts lighter or darker in the armor similar to the ship hull, that would make it look good IMO.

[Kenshiro]

How is this for a heavy cannon concept? It's in GMax, 428 polys.

 

The box on top is an electrooptical sight.

[Kenshiro]

The model file is located here.

[miceless]

Presumably you would look down onto a display for the sight, not hold it up to your eye? Looks a bit big to do that comfortably.

 

Apart from that, looks good.

[Guest drewid]

can you convert a gmax file into anything else?

.3ds .obj .max .mb .fbx would all be good

[Kenshiro]

Here's the model in .3ds format.

 

Note to self: GMax is a pain in the butt to export from.

[Guest drewid]

How did you do that??????

[revenant4]

How did you do that??????

We could tell you but we'd have to kill you then...

[Kenshiro]

Ok, ok, I'll tell you. We're only taking a pinky finger -this- time.

 

*WHOCK* *Sound of Drewid groaning bravely in the background*

 

OK, then:

 

You must download the Tempest Game pack from the Discreet site. It's buried in their site somewhere. Then, install. Mine took a number of tries to get right and then I ended up moving files around to make it work, but eventually it took.

 

Next you must export the file from GMax as a Quake III Arena file. This file format can be read by Milkshape, which you must also download and install should you not already have it. Import the Quake III file into Milkshape, and then export to whatever format you desire. You may need to move polys around some and retexture if need be.

 

The Quake III format only supports individual objects with up to 1024 polys, so if you exceed this you will have to modify or split your objects up (or redraw them from scratch) if you go over. Also, some shading and texturing stuff goes away when you move to the Q3 format so beware.

[Guest drewid]

Ok, ok, I'll tell you. We're only taking a pinky finger -this- time.

 

*WHOCK* *Sound of Drewid groaning bravely in the background*

 

OK, then:

 

You must download the Tempest Game pack from the Discreet site.  It's buried in their site somewhere. Then, install. Mine took a number of tries to get right and then I ended up moving files around to make it work, but eventually it took.

 

Next you must export the file from GMax as a Quake III Arena file. This file format can be read by Milkshape, which you must also download and install should you not already have it.  Import the Quake III file into Milkshape, and then export to whatever format you desire.  You may need to move polys around some and retexture if need be.

 

The Quake III format only supports individual objects with up to 1024 polys, so if you exceed this you will have to modify or split your objects up (or redraw them from scratch) if you go over.  Also, some shading and texturing stuff goes away when you move to the Q3 format so beware.

OK that definitely qualifies as a pain in the butt. as well as the little finger.

 

In a way it's a shame it has to go through milkshape, because of the poly limit.

 

Also at some point, at least for the final format, we are going to have to move away from .3ds. It's a nice simple reliable (usually) and almost universal format,

which makes it great from an organisational point of view, but it's not very efficient, storing each poly as a seperate entity with three verts.

 

For anyone who might not know, when you send a model to a video card you can "stripify" it (or some similar method). This means that you send the first poly, the next poly can be defined by a single vertex (plus two from the first poly, that are there already). The upshot is that most of the models vertex data can be sent in a third of the time.

 

So .3DS is great for collecting data but will need to be welded up in actual use.

[Breunor]

The last I had heard, we were going to use Milkshape's .ms3d file format for storing the files? Might have changed since I read that, but the 3ds files would be imported to Milkshape and the model saved from there. That concerns me because of the limits it imposes, I've already had to break larger buildings into several chunks due to grouping limits. I might be able to fix that, but I'll soon reach the poly limit as well. On the other hand, I paid to register that app, so I'm now partial to it...

 

For the heavy gun's scope, you could create a bend in it, so that the rear of the scope is angled up, perhaps 70 degrees from the plane of the weapon. I figure all heavy weapons are shot from the hip due to the weight, I can't believe anybody holding a 50 pound weapon up to there shoulder and firing it successfully. From the hip you could use the modified scope for targetting. How does that sound?

[red knight]

As drew said we need to find a good format to use in-game even if it is our own, I was looking for the file format of the Unreal Engine but couldnt find an specification... For archival purposes .3ds is pretty standard, but for in-game we will convert it to a suitable format... .ms3d is having very big problems on size, for simple things it is looking good, I hope those guys upgrade their format soon... Looking forward for that.

 

Greetings

Red Knight

[Guest drewid]

As drew said we need to find a good format to use in-game even if it is our own, I was looking for the file format of the Unreal Engine but couldnt find an specification... For archival purposes .3ds is pretty standard, but for in-game we will convert it to a suitable format... .ms3d is having very big problems on size, for simple things it is looking good, I hope those guys upgrade their format soon... Looking forward for that.

 

Greetings

Red Knight

How about .obj lots of packages can save that, I'm not sure about materials storage though, which are in a seperate file.

 

Another good format is .FBX (look on Kaydara website) which was made as an interchange format for Filmbox. you can get free plugins for most major art packages, plus it supports animation and bone data.

 

Though it might be easier to find details on formats used by a game mod.

It might be worth asking Kaydara, they might like the idea of their format getting this new use and "going underground".

Edited July 18, 2003 by drewid

[Breunor]

So long as there are no license issues with using the format, like there is for jpeg or something stupid like that.