ErikH2000 wrote:
Did that happen? I would have replied earlier. Just real busy right now with the beta. My inbox has your message and 20 others marked for reply. I think the dev board was the most appropriate place for this topic.
Yeah, shoulda thought of that. I was a little intimidated by all he coding messages, and there's my little one... perhaps the issue can wait until we all get our fill of DROD-making.
It's not blasphemy--it's a good idea. However, you can't begin work with a guarantee that your art will be integrated into the game (at least the Caravel distribution). There's a number of reasons for this:
1. Busy with the beta right now--not much attention will be paid to art improvements and other kinds of improvements until it's over.
2. As you understand, to really have some nice improvements we need to put in coding changes as well as art. And this requires some planning and coordination. If we aren't organized, we might decide to do something like scale up to 1024 x 768, and be unable to use your 640 x 480 art.
3. There is the "gift horse" problem with artists that we need to evaluate their capabilities and decide if they can make art in the style and quality we want. When people are kind enough to offer their help help for free, it bothers me that I need to say this, but that's how it is.
4. There's legal stuff to work out. I'm not going to explain this right now.
1) Oh yeah, I understand - the no. 1 thing I'm aiming to get out of this is some skill in computer graphics, rather than something I demand to be in DROD. The aim is more to give people a choice - if they like whatever I come up with, they can take it, if they like the standard graphics more, they can use it. If you want to use whatever I come up with as a basis for some future version of DROD's graphics, fine by me. But don't by any means feel compelled to just because someone contributed it.
I'll admit much of the idea was to field suggestions for what people would think objects (like red doors - why the hell are they there?) would look like if they were less abstract and more in the vein of the humour we see prevalent in a lot of the DROD literature. (such as the red door being a magical warning about unstable flooring, which disappears when there isn't any more, as a way to protect against being the kingdom being sued. I feel it's a bit more in the vein of DROD, or at least to my reckoning - you're the expert here, Eric.)
2) I fully understand, and although I can read some C++, I probably should leave it to the experts, and they're all busy off with the beta, as you say. I've really only worked out how to do it in the format available, and although eventually (and probably really soon) the scalable graphics will be the goal, as I say the thing's primarily for what I can do now. If it turns out I can contribute anything at that stage, I'd be glad to.
3) I fully understand this. As I've said, I don't want to force what I make (good or bad) on anyone else. Of course, I'd be delighted if this project of mine ends up going into the official release, as I'm sure any of us here would be, except for Carlo in the corner there, but then we've always thought he was a bit weird. Of course, I wouldn't mind in the slightest if it didn't. Getting it into the official release is not really the point. As I've said, (can you tell I've rewritten this three times?) don't feel compelled, just because it's there, to use it.
4) Legal issues? Oh. Well, until then, I'll just keep what I get here on my hard drive, unless the issues deal with modifying source... in which case I'll need to check what license DROD's under, as I understand it's free to modify just so long as the modification is also free. Most likely it has something to do with the 'similar elements' between Webfoot and Caravel's graphics.
It's really hard to talk about the graphics, since I've yet to come up with a good term for the bit I'm talking about, which is the bit with the rooms and the monsters, without badmouthing everything else or being confusing. I think the new graphics look lovely. I'm just a bit concerned about the old.
Sorry for the length, I'll try and wrap things up.
That's enough cracks out of you!
Oh, well done. Very droll.
Yes, DROD needs stuff like this. These are good ideas. I completely agree about the shadows, and have thought out a way to remove those extra tiles.
I don't want to be discouraging. There is a good chance we can work on DROD together after next release. Matt, a good place to start would be some kind of sample showing me what you can do!
-Erik
I have ideas too, but I'm not going to get anywhere if I don't get some sort of understanding into how the graphics engine works now, so I'll sit back on that issue. As for a sample, I can show you what I've got when I've got something more conclusive - like a spruced up level (I'm doing the Catacombs at the moment).
God I do go on a bit, don't I?
Matt
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