Treewyrm's Various Stuff

[Treewyrm]

In this thread I'll be posting screenshots and youtube videos of various stuff that I'm making in Freelancer. Some of it may get into big "Nomad update" for Discovery that I hope to release somewhere close to December of this year, others are just various tests I've done, trying new things and the results of exploring making content for Freelancer.

So as of lately I've been looking into how particle effects system works in Freelancer. It's called 'Alchemy' and turns out it's a fairly simple one, compared to similar systems in other game engines. Spent some time to see what parameters are there, what they do, how they affect the result, meretriciously writing down those findings for documentation on format. In addition to that I began working on a simple editor that'll make working with Alchemy nodes much easier. Preview mode is unlikely at this moment given that I'll need to code same system, but who knows - may be it'll come to that too.

So these are the first tests, the basic stuff.

A prototype of the effect that'll actually go into update:






Particle sprite images available in Freelancer aren't good enough, too basic in my opinion, so making my own now (they're used in two screenshots above):

[kikatsu]

Hmm nice looking stuff, especially the contrails on the fighter, that is very well done. Very spooky really, haunting even. Nice work.

[Durandal]

About time that somebody started documenting all of this stuff. I've worked out most of the parameters myself but never got into playing around with what the different emitter types actually do, so this is super cool. Can't wait to see the rest.

---

[Duvelske]

Well As i was telling On Skype when you linked me and the others the vids some time ago: "Its just great!" Also i cannot wait to See it ingame. Keep up the good work

---

User was banned for: Permbanned
Time left: (Permanent)

[razorviper]

Wow. Now the nomads are actually swimming.

[Syf]

Just awesome. Especially the contrails.

Can't wait to see more.
(That is of course, if you show more)

---

Inferno wuz here.

[kikatsu]

Out of curiosity, how do those contrails on the fighter hold up when it enters a turn?

[Dimon]

Cool... Nice one! Most I liked last one video. Really awesome

---

[Treewyrm]

Out of curiosity, how do those contrails on the fighter hold up when it enters a turn?

They're affected by velocity vector (direction and speed of the ship). But it's not the same way regular contrail effect is a trail and only visible when your ship is moving. I found this approach a better one for such effect.

[Treewyrm]

Amir asked me to make new menu background for Discovery, one that would be related to storyline, so I've decided to pick Bretonia/Gallia war, in a way a reflection of what this Conquest is.

It's not a final version yet, I have a few more things I'd like to do there, like the AA turrets projectiles at the background, flak booms in the air and such things. Thankfully that's not a problem with custom ALEs.