Map progress, new modelers and taking a break.
 

Map Progress

The Santa Monica pier map is done, and now the focus for this week was on the Warehouse and Ocean House maps. The process on porting the map is really time consuming, and because of the workflow it has, it takes time to do it right. We want to be able to get back to them and edit them if needed, which on the long run, the current workflow helps the rest of the team to be able to easily edit them without breaking anything else.

Weapons Progress

Iraito has done a great work redoing the weapons, this time on the Steyr Aug rifle. Progress on receating the weapons is going quite well, getting closer on having all major weapons done.

 

Unity Editor

We’ve gotten to an ugly part of Unity where the editor starts to crash a lot. This happens because of the limited memory access Unity currently has due to being 32-bit only. As the project grows bigger each time, while more contents being ported and reworked, it gets closer on hitting this limit. The only way to combat it is to create new projects and work on one thing at a time, but this approach starts to get messy and harder to maintain. The only proper solution to it without interrupting the workflow would be to switch to Unity 5, which is going to be mandatory as the project grows.
 

Modelers

As many of you know, the project is created out of labor of love and passionate fans. But it’s not enough for the small team to carry everything through. But the never ending search on passionate people is what leads the project on. And now to welcome Scarlett and Damien into the team!
 
Scarlett is going to be in charge with the animations and mostly character design while Damien with prop modeling and environmental modeling. We usually like to keep it open in terms of what task to be done, unless given otherwise. Because it’s a fan project, and a big one, it’s best to keep the flow going naturally. Else passion turns to a chore, which isn’t an issue on its own, but on a project that is done in everyone’s free time, there isn’t much to compensate for their time for the time being.
 
Which is why I’ve decided to open up the modeling section for those who’d like to help us, we should mention it is still a fan-made project, made out of die-hard love for the game. We hope to see more skilled talented folks coming along.
 

Color Mask Shader

I’ve started working on an early color mask shader that allows you to change the hue tint on a player model but not limited to, with the help of a color mask. I’m planning on implementing mask color support to work with wall and other things to bring in proper customization.

The interface is just a quick setup, but it’s a good enough working example for the shader.

Bolt

Since Bolt is still fresh and it has a few missing keys, and because of that, the update on the multiplayer will be slow going, more or less missing the estimated release of an alpha. But on a bright side, more features will be arriving this fall, and a lot of bug testing and enhancement is going on, so overall it’s not all bad.
 
The only thing the project suffers right now on the multiplayer side is the documentation for Bolt being outdated and not catching up in speed with its code along with several missing key components, and in order for it to happen is get back to it once Bolt has gotten the needed updates. It’s the sacrifice you’d need to take for using bleeding edge technology, but on the long run it’s the right choice and we’re on the right track.
 

Interface Changes

Teemu has done it again, adding great improvements on the overall HUD.

When you are in combat mode, all the HUD elements tied to it show up. After a short period, only the important ones remain, the rest will fade out.

Here are a few of the HUD elements that show up, with a brief explanation. Note that this will not cover the weapon selection screen as of yet.

 

Taking a Break

I’ve been meaning to take a short break from the project to refresh myself with new ideas and to keep being productive, but I’ve been caught up with quite a momentum so I didn’t want to risk that. However over time, I’ve started feeling less motivated, up to the point of feeling burned out, which I’ll save for another blog post later on. In short, I’ll be taking a long break, in order to keep things going. It makes sense, in a long run to keep things going.
 

That doesn’t mean the project won’t be getting any progress. In the meantime, I’ll still be instructing the new members with their tasks. It also should be enough time for uGUI and Bolt to fix the current issues we’ve been having. It’ll also save us from the effort on investing into figuring out why x is not working as intended.
As for the development blog, it’ll probably be postponed until my return. Or it’ll keep going on with the results of the rest of the team. Not sure what the future brings, and I would not think about it for the time being, so you’d know what to expect.
 

Summary

There have been some progress done, but not as I would have anticipated. While the project will be put to rest on my end, expect a whole lot to happen once I’m fully recovered. This means the multiplayer won’t be delivered as promised, but it’s better to be a bit more patient, since we know it will take us a lot of time until we reach the baseline, and rushing it won’t make it better either. But assembling a better team will surely help with that. And now, with that said, I’ll see you guys in a month.