At last! Discotheque Of Doom ins running for me...

[RobSeegel]

aquaMat - I made an attempt at re-creating a few of your custom graphics so that they blend in with MM HD. I created ones that were reused in a few mansions, and were based on existing game graphics so they weren't too bad to do.

The email bounced when I tried to send them, though. It's not as though there were that many images or they were particularly large.

[aquaMat]

@ Rob Seegel (and all others):

I could not be online yesterday and I am surprised how many new posts have arrived in the meantime.
Please allow me a little time until I have read them all carefully and then I will reply in detail.
Rob, thank you especially for taking the time and trying a few things out.....

I'll be back again later.....

[SandyBean]

I would love to see more of AquaMats CM's converted, I'm desperate for more play time, and have played ALL the mansions twice over now in all formats ! 8-) ;D

@ Rob; thanks So Much for your input on IR, would it be too much to ask if you could convert it over to HD  (I'm not sure how) ... ONLY when and IF you have time.  If it's playable without the custom graphics, that's perfectly fine with me !  :-*

Also, thanks everyone, for the renewed MM Family forum enthusiasm, support of IR, and congrats sent to our ever growing and beautiful Puppies !!!

take care,

SandyBean  [smiley=2vrolijk_08.gif]

[RobSeegel]

@ SandyBean

OK, I'll go ahead and convert it, there's no major reason why folks shouldn't be able to play it. Technically, all someone would have to do to get the backgrounds would be to put them in the game directory, replacing (and hopefully backing up) the originals, but I have a *really* hard time recommending something that I didn't like doing myself for MM1 years ago.

I'm sure that in time, we'll be able to add those custom backgrounds back in. I've asked Vern about it, and hopefully I'll get a response soon. My thinking is even if the builder is a bit delayed it would be nice to at least be able to play all the existing mansions. The only thing truly missing is support for custom backgrounds. For everything else there is a way forward. A difficult way, perhaps, but still a way.

I'll take of it tonight, when I get home.

[aquaMat]

5D606D5C6A6A686A630F0 wrote: (...) (removed my old quote from your quote)

I'm not sure it's as bad as you think. I could have sworn that there were some that didn't need as much work as others in terms of graphics conversion. I think it's also worth seeing if we can do something about those levers with graphics. Between new graphics and a script to do most of the lever moving, that wouldn't be too big a deal.

That sounds good. It'll be great if it turned out to be less work than I fear at the moment. And it'd be fantastic if we could somehow 'save' my 'buried levers'.... !!

5D606D5C6A6A686A630F0 wrote:

Rob, one more question:  what did you and the other designers use when preparing the all-new designs for the HD version ?? I certainly can't imagine you went thru all that trouble of designing in the old editor and than replacing all parts using your described Rezycle method ?!

So I reckon you must have built some sort of tool for yourselves to help you make those new designs?

No. We used the old editor, which was actually a pretty big hassle. All the mansions in the HD game get stored in the old way. That is the only way they can be edited - aside from some really experimental stuff I've been doing. Prior to shipping, the original formats have to be converted using rezycle. Generally, this is pretty easy. Occasionally, one or two custom graphics may have to be added after Rezycle has unpacked everything. Fortunately, there are not many custom graphics in the new game. Jacob redid *all* the graphics though.

What this meant is that if you worked on the mansion, you had to work on it as though you building a mansion for MM1, then to see what your changes looked like, you would then have to convert it, and open it as a mansion (or custom mansion) in the new game. As you can imagine, this was a little tedious. Because the mansion and the builder were working off of different files, I could bring up the game and the old builder at the same time and flip back and forth between the two windows.

Ohmygawd......  that sounds really tedious indeed. I would have thought you'd have had a 'not-meant-for-release-version' of a HD-editor at least.....  but like this it sure sounds like hard work.

5D606D5C6A6A686A630F0 wrote:
I did end building out some tools, but they were command line based. I wrote a few Perl scripts to help me quickly identify potential or known issues. I didn't actually build any new mansions for the game. That was done by Toybox, Jacob, and Vern. I ended up scrubbing all the existing

included

mansions. Scrubbing included:

- Finding and correcting any odd Layer 6 issues

These fixes were areas were for areas where the illusion was spoiled. For example, a short pillar in layer that

supported

the ceiling above it. There were many, many areas where Jack would be

behind

the pillar, jump, and then appear in front of the tiles the pillar was supporting. This sort of thing spoils the illusion and tends to look

weird

to the eye. There were lots of different cases here, that were dealt with in various ways. Some of this was easy, some was a bit more work.

I can't stand these kind of things, either.... but to be very precise in those areas is something I had to learn over time....  so while probably all of my mansions from the last 4 years or so should be very exact + correct in this respect, it might be possible to detect some of those layer-mistakes (or rather: design flaws) in some of my very early mansions like PoG, SPoG or DoD.
In fact - while checking DoD in the old editor 2 days ago (to see what amount of custom graphics it features) I in fact came across at least 2 situations where a roof should have been painted into layer-6 (but was in layer-4)

5D606D5C6A6A686A630F0 wrote:
- Removing *most* designer-painted shadows

I was sure that this would be the most controversial of the changes, yet I don't recall anything getting upset. Vern added game-generated shadows to MM HD. These shadows generally look better than the painted in shadows because they more closely resemble the item that casts the shadow, and there is a bit more consistency. I believe that tiles in layers 4 and 6 will cast shadows, initially only in rooms with a black background. Otherwise, Birds and other creatures could cast

shadows

on the sky background image, which looked strange. Game generated shadows can also be disabled in newer versions of the old Builder.

This probably should be disabled by default for all custom mansions, because I can tell you first-hand that removing most of the designer-added shadows was tedious in the extreme. If you don't remove them, then the game will add shadows on top of areas where the developer already painted them in. These areas will be darker than what the designer intended, slight ruining the effect. Areas that were shaded may become black outright.

Luckily I only rarely  painted / designed in shadows myself.....

5D606D5C6A6A686A630F0 wrote:
- Correcting some block inconsistencies

There are basically two kinds of Bricks most often used in Layer 4. You have the bricks that are smart enough to

assemble

themselves when you are painting them in. There are others for each color that have to be manually and painstakingly assembled. In the past, these two types were mixed together in some places. The problem with this is that Vern applies some sort of logic to the

smart

bricks while slightly and somewhat randomly alters their appearance to add some variety and keep things from looking too uniform. It's a very nice effect that I was skeptical about at first.
The problem is that if you mix and match the

smart

bricks with the others, then it noticeably throws off the effect. This was among my least favorite things to fix, because it was tough to detect i the MM1 Builder..

Here I am afraid I'd be guilty - simply BECAUSE I am so keen on graphic details I used to plant each individual brick by hand most of the time - and I am sure there might be enough situations where I used both types next to each other.... but when I did, I did that exactly FOR the

irregularity effect

- and I always double checked how it looked. It always looked great in the original game..... but I have no idea how it will

translate

into the HD-version...!?!

5D606D5C6A6A686A630F0 wrote:
- Taking a first cut to see how the mansions appeared with the new graphics.

kind of self-explanatory. By the end, I was getting pretty sick of looking at all the mansions. For some reason, it was a *lot* more work that I thought it was going to be. I hope some of this make sense. Feel free to ask if it's not clear.

(...)

Yes, I can very well imagine how that added up to a pretty frustrating bunch of work.... and that you eventually ran out of time  and nerves to continue....

[aquaMat]

Sorry for replying to some of your posts a bit randomly (= not in the order you have sent them....) though I had started w/ the earliest one below..... this is one of your latest ones:

506D6051676765676E020 wrote: aquaMat - I made an attempt at re-creating a few of your custom graphics so that they blend in with MM HD. I created ones that were reused in a few mansions, and were based on existing game graphics so they weren't too bad to do.

The email bounced when I tried to send them, though. It's not as though there were that many images or they were particularly large.

Wow, fantastic - good to hear that !!
BUT: What do you mean when you say 'the email bounced when (you) tried to send them' ?? Did you try to send them to me or where ?

[aquaMat]

102D2011272725272E420 wrote: [quote author=415C4056330 link=1334071748/36#36 date=1335870035]That would be great! I am missing aguamats mansions!!!!

I did a few tests and custom backgrounds don't work. I probably knew that but forgot. Still, I think for some mansions this will only have a small impact. It won't impact many of aquamat's since most don't use custom backgrounds. Whether it greatly impacts Immortal Ruins is up to SandyBean. Otherwise, I'd be up for uploading it, because it plays mostly fine without the various backgrounds. As I mentioned before - I did notice another graphical glitch in other rooms, but it didn't cause the game to crash or make it unplayable.

With aquamat's, it's kind of a mixed bag. All the mansions where the levers have been submerged so that the base is no longer visible are now unplayable. In some of those mansions there are a *lot* of levers. I am still looking for my set of scripts. I thought I had one which would identify all these cases and optionally fix them. So these shouldn't be converted without at least that change.

The mansions where there is only one or two custom graphics, seems to me like maybe it wouldn't be too bad without them in order to get another playable mansion out there. Aquamat may feel differently. As I said, for mansions where it is just one or two graphics, it's probably fine depending on which images they are. For other mansions where there are 5 or more, I think the changes start to drastically impact the look and feel, but still if the mansion designer is Ok with it - at least temporarily, then why not?

With the remaining mansions, we should at least try to contact the designers first. I'm fairly certain that Anthony would *not* wish his mansions to be modified by anyone else - especially the ones that use extensive custom graphics. Some of these would be completely ruined without the custom graphics, IMO.
First things first:

1. It's true, I hardly ever used custom backgrounds (maybe once or twice at max., my guess would be if at all it's in DoD).  But nevertheless it's a shame that they no longer work. But that can't be too big of an issue, to make them work again, at least I would think so. 

2. As for those levers: wouldn't it be easiest to convince Vern to either UNDO  his lever 'improvement' to how it used to be (= allowing levers to be buried and still work)  OR at least - like some of the other improved / changed features - make it choosable for the designer (on a per-mansion basis) whether the mansion in question allows levers to be buried or not ??
I really can't see a real reason for a lever 'improvement' that prohbits these lowered / buried levers anyway.

A potential (although less 'funny') alternative would be to simply add another lever-design to the catalog of sprites, one which simply does NOT have a base at all.... so when used would look almost like the buried ones.  (I say 'almost' and 'less funny' because it wouldn't really look buried since it'll probably be just as long as the ones with bases.....whereas the buried ones are 1 unit shorter in size).

However, this third alternative would certainly be the easiest route to go, programming-wise.

BTW: In one of my hardest mansions, JUMP!, I even came up with the

upside-down - lever

, which is hanging from the ceiling and can still be pulled by Jack. I was very proud of that..... and I bet my a#s this will definitely not work any longer, right ?!

3. As for the use of custom graphics in my mansions:
Indeed, if I remember correctly, the mansions where I really used several custom graphics, aren't all that many.
There are a lot of mansions where I didn't use any custom graphics at all, and several where I only slightly changed the look of Jack.

There are a few though, like DoD, where the custom graphics are essential to the gaming experience and/or the theme of the mansion. In DoD for example you have custom BBBs (including custom 70s-style text boards that appear when you activate / read a BBB), you have custom paintings and other disco-related design objects, including dancers etc. Most important are probably the changed bricks, platforms etc.  But in most later mansions (say from 2008 onward) I rather tried to work with the tools (sprites, bricks etc.) we're given and (ab-)use and/or conform them for my purpose than use too much custom graphics.

Some mansions feature both approaches, like THE FOUR TUBES, which does include 1 sort of custom bricks (lemon-colored), several custom paintings and maybe 1 or 2 other custom-bits.  That should be manageable.....

[aquaMat]

65607C6A7F6766616A0F0 wrote: @ (...)
@ aquamat:

Here's an idea- how about modifying your unfinished rooms/mansions and adding them to Catacombs? Lots of people are still replaying MM1 (me included!) Kickstarting Catacombs (or Catacombs in MM2) may encourage builders to add their unfinished mansions too.

@ Josephine:

I don't think that would make sense, mainly because
1. All of these half- or almost-finished mansions of mine have a distinct theme (and look) of their own which would not fit or suit Catacomb's theme and look.
2. Most of those mansions are already in their unfinished state way bigger than the usual Catacombs section.
3. Several of them include custom graphics, which - as far as I remember - were not allowed in Catacombs.

But this idea of yours has some potential nevertheless..... I maybe should consider combining several of the unfinished creations into one larger construct. It still might take a fair amount of work....and it surely wouldn't look very elegant, and I'd probably hesitate to make it a proper release..... BUT it could be something for that

unofficial releases list

that we used to have. (BTW, is that still active ?)

Thanks for bringing it up..... I'll think about it.

[aquaMat]

One other question:

I can very well remember that there always used to be the possibility to later (re-)edit one of my own posts after it had already been published (e.g. when you detect an error or typo days later etc.)..... but somehow I can't find that EDIT button any longer.

Has it vanished or am I completely sitting on my eyes now ?
:-[   

I have found at least two typos in earlier posts of mine I'd like to correct.

[RobSeegel]

2D3D392D012D384C0 wrote:

Yes, I can very well imagine how that added up to a pretty frustrating bunch of work.... and that you eventually ran out of time  and nerves to continue....

It's probably not as bad as I made it sound. It was a load of work, but a lot of it was self-imposed. I didn't have to by hyper critical about the L6 issues, and a lot of it definitely got easier with practice. I learned a heck of a lot about when and when L6 should probably be used. My own personal take on it is that if it can't be used convincingly and well, then it's more trouble than it's worth - similar to 3D used in movies. Otherwise it's irritating and takes you out of the game.

The admins did *none* of the things I described with the custom mansions. These sorts of changes were to be left to designers if they felt they needed them. They were things that largely amounted to eye candy and were not deal-breakers.

The one I worry most about is the new shadows. Very wisely only enabled it when the Black background was used. So, this will cut out a lot of ways in which it could look horrible. I *mostly* like the new shadows, though there are places where you need to be careful as a designer.

Let's say you have the same

flat

tile used in multiple layers (Layer 1 and Layer 6 and/or Layer 4) You might do this if you want to make some object

invisible

- coins, keys, etc. In the game if game generated shadows are active in that room, it will spoil the illusion, unless the tiles are black on black. The layers that are hiding the object will cast a shadow. The newest Builder (that only works on Snow Leopard and earlier provides you with an option to disable the shadows.

The only other way shadows are a nuisance will be if you have a very carefully designed mansion with lots of painted shadows. It can be awful to see all that work marred by the generated shadows. Generally, having game generated shadows saves a lot of design time, and looks pretty good - in some ways better than hand-painted ones, and in some ways worse.