[MOD][WIP] FTL: Overdrive

[DryEagle]

Those websites tend to be optimised for filesize so they can lose image quality. Instead, you should just get a program for it. I recommend unFreez, which is just a standalone exe and does the job easily enough: http://www.mediafire.com/download.php?xycnnh8oih5ftnu

that being said, the original images weren't exactly super high fidelity to begin with (transparent background would have been nice for starters)

[kartoFlane]

I was mostly trying to provide some counter-arguments to consider *shrug* if gifs are easier to implement, and we don't lose much of the image's quality, then I'm all for it.

Regarding the other two topics, the animation scripting consistency issue will be relatively simple, if we're going to implement it as "just point it to an animated gif".
And animated ship sprites will be just a formality in this case... Perhaps it would be possible to implement parts that would play their animation only a certain event is triggered (for example a weapon/artillery is fired)?

[Kieve]

I'm not a coder so I can't speak for which one might be easier to implement.

As a modder however, I would much prefer using a single PNG sheet and the associated XML code to needing three or five different .GIF files for "Weapon_Off, Weapon_On, Weapon_Charging, Weapon_Firing" etc.
Also in terms of quality, I've yet to see a .GIF file that can do partial transparency as smoothly as a PNG. There might be third-party programs that can get decent graphical fidelity out of a .GIF but I have zero interest in needing yet another program to create at lesser quality what I can already make with my current photoshop and some time in Notepad.

Bottom line, I don't care if .GIF is optionally supported, but don't force me to use it for Overdrive modding.

[boa13]

Quite simply, GIF cannot do transparency as well as PNG, because it only has one possibility for transparency (is the pixel transparent or not; and this costs 1 color out of the 256 that GIF can store).

GIF is a very old format (1989), and PNG was designed to overcome its shortcomings (in 1996). That is why PNG can store 256 levels of transparency (maybe even 65536 levels), in addition to storing color. It's too bad that MNG (animated PNG) has not caught on as well as GIF animations.

[John Luke Pack Hard]

I think we can resolve both issues if we (the coders) create an "animsheet" object in Java that can be dropped anywhere an image normally would be and displays it's animation when invoked.

Through inheritance, this is certainly possible.

[speedoflight]

The difference is that for GIFs the software already exists, and is easy to use with very straightforward and nice user interface. The one I linked, you litearlly drag in the images, set the delay time between them, and hit the make gif button. Takes like 5 seconds.

For PNGs, to animate them, they would have to write a ton of extra code for overdrive, for managing animation files, and you would have to learn how to use their code, for managing animation files. Overdrive won't use the same format as stock FTL for animations because it's limited and buggy as f*** and generally doesn't often do what you want it to do. So it's a case of them having to write a system for creating animated graphics from scratch, or using an already well-established, easy-to-use format.

Don't forget that overdrive won't be supporting legacy mod. We already have FTL+GMM for that. You'll have to make new mods for overdrive anyway.

Also, testing a gif is easy. Doubleclick it to open. You can immediately see if it's working or not. Rather than having to patch it into the game, start a new game, go through the menus, get to space, etc etc, just to see your animation.

So basically u like gifs cuz u have an editor that saves u a lot of work (btw u can do that even with photoshop as well..)?? i dont think thats a good point lol. The only advantage of a gif image is , as u said, u can see the image animated before u include it on the mod. PNG is far more powerful than gif, and i dont know if overdrive will handle the png format worst than the gif one, u saying that u change the animation values in the gif editor in the case of gifs, its the same as doing it in the txt files in the case of png files. The quality of the final image is far worst in gif than with png format. If Overdrive is going to be able to use higher resolutions, i really dont see a good choice using gif instead of png.

[John Luke Pack Hard]

Ok... I'm going to mark the issue between gif and png as *resolved*

Modder's End:
PNG sheet - horizontal sprite format
XML sheet - number of frames and PNG image pathname

Coding Engine:
Constructor:

• Extend from image class, giving it basic image usability and functionality
• Load relevant data
• Allocate space for images
• split PNG into frames
• Create PNG array of frames
• Add changelistener to detect when the game advances a frame, so that the "image" displays a new frame

There, we have created a convenient format for modders and coders and preserved image quality. This new object can be used anywhere that an image would normally be displayed, simply through implementation of some special logic.

Also, speedoflight, I would kindly recommend you improve your:

• Composure
• Writing skills

This is a *planning* discussion, not a debate.

[John Luke Pack Hard]

The next topic is the sole topic in the "augment's category".

Now, we discuss the broad topic of adding and/or modifying augments. What format should we use to specify augment behavior?

Given the broad possibilities of augments and the possibility of augments being completely mod-specific (due to special variables implemented by that mod), I'm currently more in favor of having it obtain functionality from third-party plugins, with some xmlsheet data for interface-specific behavior (even then, the interface is also up for debate).

[kartoFlane]

Since we're planning the animation class' structure, I'll mention an issue that I noticed in DryEagle's pirates mod; specifically, some animations appear to be hardcoded in that some are played from start to beggining, and others play random frames of the animation (namely, the "console typing" animation).

Guess this could be resolved by introducing a simple boolean that would allow to choose between a start-to-finish and random animations... Since a more complex system would be rather redundant in this case.

edit
Regarding augments:
I've been thinking that augments could be implemented via a scripting language, for example lua. That way, each augment could be implemented as an external script (loaded as a plugin) and allow for a variety of uses, through lua functions.
I imagine it would also be much more flexible and powerful than xml's data structures

I guess KuroSaru's response to my earlier inquiry is pretty relevant here

[speedoflight]

All I did was take speedoflight's image section and upload it to an online .gif creator website (there's a plethora of them).

Only, the effect is stacked, it should be placing frame after frame, not frame over the previous one.. dunno if u know wat i mean. This type of "beam" is designed to be placed along the entire lenght of the beam, starting with the frame 1 and ending with the last frame. After that, the frames are switching places one after another.