Position: Team Leader, 3D modeller, event scripter, sound design, level design, texture design
Occupation: Aspiring Game Designer, Restaurant Front Worker
Age: 21
Listening to: Bach - organ chorales from the leipzig Manuscript vol 1
Here we go! It's been a while since the last update so let's get right down to business.
First off, in case anyone's reading this who doesn't already know, JPDS1 is now going to be the only JPDS level made for the Trespasser engine, seeing as my little band of modders has opted to move on from Trespasser's static, unfixable core engine and develop our own (not quite from scratch, but starting from a renowned existing rendering engine, I'll let Rex explain that sometime if he wants to). Now, many of you have already heard this - what you haven't heard is that the entire Embryonics Administration, once the premier location of the level, is quite sadly going to be shaven off. Some weeks prior to the decision about a new engine, I had already planned to put the EA in its own level sighting concerns over FPS and level object population (the palette issue was a consideration but has now been fixed). Now, it's just not going to be in there at all. Crafting models for Trespasser and modern engines are entirely different occupations and at this point, I don't even want to go-there-do-that to make the whole EA twice. Our new engine will do it all way better. This philosophy is also partially behind the decision to make only the bare necessities for JPDS1 as far as new models goes. Where possible, existing Trespasser models will be used or retextured instead.
Probably the biggest thing that the Trespasser edition of JPDS1 will be missing is the bulk of the story that was to be told. The EA is really where all the mysteries unfold and more questions start getting asked/answered.. there will be some still present in JPDS1 but it's just not going to be what I wanted. I am confident I can bring everything together how I wanted in JPDS with a new engine - it's going to be sweet. Sad to say, this also means that the JPDS private forum here will remain private for quite some time, most likely. I may try getting a few non-sensitive threads moved into this section for some entertainment.. I'm going to have a much larger audience now for JPDS and letting you all in on some secrets will be just fine - and I doubt many of them will find their way into this forum lol.
As a final note on changes to the plan of action, there will no longer be the much-anticipated (at least, behind the scenes) new Trespasser health system, I am very sad to say. HP was going to be set at a high number (perhaps around 200-500) and the Regeneration value (as yet untested with the Player class) was to be used to halt the regeneration of HP - as the player, you would be forced to forage for food in the game's environment. There were to be mushrooms and fruits and coconuts and crap like that.. at this point there just isn't enough time for implementation and experimental tweaking. What's yet undecided is if I will be using the new ammo system where you can reload your guns with ammo... While I'd love to do that and it wouldn't be *too* hard, it would still most likely add at least 3 days to project completion and I may not be able to afford that. I may still *possibly* attempt it if someone wants to help out with that.. *stares at Rex*
Oh yeah. This also means there will be no JPDS2 Spino. SI, sometime soon we might as well release the various dinos we've been keeping on hold. Actually, we ought to make a little level to populate with them, just for fun.. What about that little Mayan place of yours?
And now it's getting late.. here are some pics of my latest progress, enjoy.
Peace out ya'll
I see you decided to not recreate the entire Lodge and just make it a foundation like the hotel in Trespasser. Nice billboard too.
And well, yes it's not going to be the entire lodge but the site is not hardly finished just yet - some areas will be just foundations but I'm going to have some new concrete walls similar to the ones seen in the JPDS~testing destructable building demo. The scaffolding objects are also going to get lots of use for some 'fun' puzzles. 