G' Day Cybernescence your work is phenomable, I could not believe it was a GG Project, It has given me new confidence, and anticipation of producing something worthwhile.

May I ask how you managed to produce your own NPC's, and other models for GG (not in any detail though). With the Older FPSC
there were dozens of NPC's in various packs to choose from, in GG very few at this time.

I'm buying this game when it is released for sure.

@Crazy Programmer - Thank you!

@ Wolf -

Shh, I'm sick of those men with the pointy wooden sticks

@ ozziedave

Thank you! I get a lot of inspiration/motivation from other WIP games here.



I used 'Fuse' - longer version below:

####
Here is the outline of the workflow for Fuse characters to GG using Ultimate Unwrap Pro & Fragmotion (took me days to get this working and find a convertor that wasn't 3dsMax, that would successfully convert the animations).

This will seems like a lot of work, and it kind of is for the first pass through, but once done (and you have the animations converted) you can get the rigged character processed by Fuse into GG in under 15 minutes:

Download Fuse character creator, then use to create your NPC character in Fuse (the fun part!)
Click 'Animate' in Fuse (this uploads to Mixamo/Adobe site - register/login required)
The Mixamo site then auto rigs the character (takes about a minute).
Download the rigged model as FBX
Use Ultimate Unwrap Pro to open the downloaded FBX (can also use this to create the atlas texture if required - easy tutorial to follow on the Unwrap site - http://www.unwrap3d.com/u3d/tutorial_repaint.aspx - just follow it and it will convert the multiple textures into one atlas texture). Note - Sometimes the model poly counts creep up a bit too much for GG - Ultimate Unwrap can reduce these too.

Save to .x format in Ultimate Unwrap.

Open previous .x in Meshview and save (basically just adds a root bone at 0,0,0, but easiest way I've found to do it). Note - "Meshview" is a Microsoft progam that comes with the Directx9 SDK - it was free but I'm not sure where you would get it now. The process might work without this step. If you do get it just open the model and then save it again with a different name and use this version for next steps.

Open the .x in Fragmotion and scale all to 0.4 (0.4 seems to be about right - but can experiment to get different height NPCs):
Open Fragmotion and "import" the converted .x file into Fragmotion - you should see the model in the viewport.
From main menu choose Transform>Transform Options ...
In the window that opens select 'Scale' (make sure 'Rotate' and 'Position' unticked)
enter 0.4 in 'x' box and select/tick "Uniform".
Then press apply. This should scale mesh and skeleton down uniformly.

Merge in animations (see below)
Select the animations you want from Fuse website and download them as .FBX - convert to .X with Ultimate Unwrap (as above - but these are just animations, no mesh). Name them, say 'run', walk' etc so easier to remember later.

Then with your character model still open in Fragmotion, from menu click File>Merge Animation, choose the animation .x file, then select 'exact match', then OK. Do this for each animation you want (converted from fbx as above).

The animations need to be collated into singletrack (Fragmotion makes this really easy) and the start/end frames entered into the appropriate fpe slots. This can take a bit of time, but only needs to be done once then can reuse the (full set of) animations (& most of the fpe) for all characters.

To do this go into animation tab on the right of Fragmotion and double click one of the animations in the tree window. Then in the keyframe editor click edit "append animations" and sort them in the order you want then append together in one track - think you get a message asking if you want the frame references saved - click yes to this.

Check the animations work by clicking on the merged one in the tree view and clicking the play icon in status bar at bottom. If all OK, delete the individual animations (leaving the new combined single-track one of course) and then export to a new .x file. Then try importing this into GG - you'll need to use the saved animation frame references to put into the fpe file (create/adjust the fpe file and add the animation frames into the relevant 'csi_' slots).

Hope this helps. It can be done using 3dsMax too I believe.


####



Thanks - you'll get a nice discount

Cheers.

I was thinking of mouse on the moon. And also a film where he designed a metal that defied gravity in a country cottage. Can not remember the name of the film but I enjoyed it. I think ron moody was in it. But not sure. Actually it could of been paint. And maybe first men in the moon. Or something to that. I enjoyed it anyway

Hi cybernescence, many thanks for the information much appreciated.

Hi - yes it was based on the Cavorite sphere from 'First Men In The Moon' film from the sixties, based on the HG Wells novel.

Work continues on the London 1882 level - aiming to fill the full GG map and it's taking some considerable time, but I think you'll like it in the end

Some other characters the intrepid adventurer may encounter within the cogwheel universe:





Cheers.

Taking a break from alternative old London (aol) to swim out to the sword of the ocean ...

Nice! Nautilus!

Now that is something else wow dude absolutely awesome

Amazing work... great focus, your in the zone and the content is flowing... And yes the vid with the floating ships....omg

Thanks guys - appreciate the comments

Just about finished the 'Nautiloid' now, this model has an interior and am moving on to the submarine scripts now - looking forward to taking this for its first voyage at sea ... I'll post a video after I've checked for leaks

Impressive. Amazing work.

now that is fantastic yet again. you been on holiday i cant keep up with the thread

Seems like the textures in those newer screenshots are nice and crisp compared to older ones. It looks freaking beautiful man!

Thanks for the kind comments Isagabe, science boy and Landman

Been a bit stuck with some issues re the underwater level development, and, well, unfortunately it's goodbye to sub nautical adventures within Cogwheel Chronicles.

As most terrain sculpting under the water plane is not saved (and only then to a maximum 'depth' of 500 units), it is too limiting for underwater game play. Until the terrain system is replaced (years away?) or the fixed water level/plane can be scriptable to move up (who knows when ...), then submarine levels and exploration won't work too well.

So I'll leave you with this wip video, but this concept is now firmly on the dusty 'maybe later' shelf ...



Cheers.

Back to air adventures and the first air worthiness test flight of the 'SteamHawk' ... in which the pilot managed to shoot himself down with the BoomHilda .

The Empire just sat and watched as a peaceful trader (ahem) was minding his own business and was attacked by sand pirates who have acquired a RotorChair and a BFC (Big Flying Cannon). Disgraceful, why do we pay our taxes ...



Got some collision issues to iron out, but the flying attack AI is coming on OK.

Cheers.

There is a lot of evolution going on here. Everything new looks a lot more advanced than what has been shown in a previous post.
I'm excited to see this progress, but I keep seeing you presenting a lot of complex models, please don't forget to create the clutter and world building props...while its a lot more dull, its needed for the visual immersion
This evolves into something brilliant and I hope we will see a release some time in the future!

is that james bond -007 of steam world in little nell?

i love all this so would Q of Qbranch. i love the ideas gonna have to get your formula one day... but not yet! i have too much else to do

sooo good m8 I love your style

Gotta admit, haven't followed this as much as i should have, What was i thinking?! Freakin' awesome man, absolutely stellar work. Keep it up!

Thanks for the comments guys.

@wolf - yes, you have spotted the weakness, I'm much better at coding than modelling . But having said that, levels are underway and hopefully you will think they are OK (won't be at your high level), but I'll go for 'OK' in you eyes for now

@science boy - the 'little nellie' is a composite of the original time machine from the 1960 film ... (think it was a Cosmic Prophet FPSC model, or at least in a community pack) and some big rotor blades. So a hat tip to both HG Welles and Mark Hodder (who writes the 'Burton & Swinburne' steampunk books - where 'RotorChairs' come in very handy).

@Honkeyboy & Johno15 - thanks for the comments fellas appreciate it.

I've been trying to blend third person and first person gameplay together, in that without weapons (or with empty weapon selected) the player view is third person, but when a weapon is selected it drops into first person view for use and combat. Unfortunately GG has beaten me again and can't quite get there for this either at the moment - would need an engine command to enable the switch.

So a quick video of Cathodia (Callan) who is the female protagonist for cogwheel Chronicles. Here she has lost her way ...



Cheers.

Amazing! I can't wait till we have weapon support for our own models and rigs. Again, stellar job!

Watching the progress of this is a fascinating look into the progression of a serious game, thanks for that. Really hope it sells good when done and you make bank.

i fancy callan is she single?

thats really, really nice cybernescence!

She looks a bit like a character from an old RPG: FinalFantasy7
Really nice work, I like the animations, very fluid.

Your game has a victorian miniskirt wearing character and mine a gothic miniskirt wearing character. GameGuru: Together we skirt!

... I see myself out.



-Wolf

i was a goth back in late 80s. i wore black a lot crimpers, saw original goth bands in the 80s i was always in goth night clubs aged 15. ( naughty) but what a fantastic little scene.

@ D13
Development for third person is lagging behind, I don't even know if it's on the voting board, guess I should check and alter my vote if it is. If it isn't it's a serious bit of a missing functionality. Got my eye on your desert buildings for the aeronaut's isle level
Thanks for the encouragement

@ Sativa Savant - thank you for comments.
Me too

@ science boy
I take it from that, it's not just me that prefers 'following' a TP female around in a game

Did you have finger nails filed to a point and painted black too ?

@ 0Alemar0
Thank you, as is your game WIP

@ Wolf
Heh. Well there's no point in fighting the lure of the mini-skirt'ed heroine is there

Haven't got much of a visual update. For the most part of this week I've been wrestling with save and load to also dump all lua tables and make sure sprites go away and come back again when required after a reload event. Got there in the end but took way longer than I had budgeted for.

To keep SB happy, another picture of Cathodia in her aeronaut gear

cybernescence your characters are bloomin brilliant m8 very sword of the new world looking, used to love those characters just sooooooooo good I want them lol not for a game just to pin up above the missis bed lol

If I'm going to spend 50+ hours playing a 3rd person shooter, I don't want to spend it looking at a man's bum

*Agrees with Gtox*

cool so we all fancy your character cybernescence so is she single?

wow. most impressing. i love steampunk. i wanted to have a steampunk wedding but my idea came too late

Thanks guys, really appreciate the comments

Haven't posted in this thread for a while, not that development has calmed down at all - far from it, just had lots of other tasks to complete (VPS provider 'accidently' wiped and couldn't recover our sites - luckily had alternatives and back-ups for just about everything except blog sites - but still took weeks to sort out - and still got some mop up work to do).

Anyhow as regards Cogwheel - I've been working on updates to the post-bloom.fx shader for GG as I need some special effects, most notably 'lens flare'. A lot of the Cogwheel game play involves flying steampunk style airships and machines and I really wanted the sun lens flare effect to be part of the aether (enemies coming out of the sun glare etc). I know lens flare isn't a 'real' effect but I think it looks really cool (I might be alone in this, but there we go).

So I have got this working and some extra 'vibrance' tone control, which also gives the whole feel of the game something a bit different. I'll post a video in a few days to show the effects.

Whilst I was on a bit of a roll with post processing I thought I'd give FXAA a look see ... kind of wish I hadn't as it sucked up a lot of time, but finally think I'm getting somewhere in adding this to GG natively (i.e. without reshade or something like that). If I knew more about HLSL it would go a lot easier

Still, I can see some reduction in the jagged edges, not sure they are marked enough to warrant all the effort, but see what you think:





Also been working on a converting a new 'hero' airship, the Ellenora, and the scripts so that it can be animated, flown and you can walk around on deck, rotate and translate (rotate sucked up 3 days to get the calcs correct) aware.



That's it for now ... feedback welcome

That FXAA is quite an improvement. Well done! What's the performance hit like?

Also! Can't wait to see the video. With the Ellenora are you able to submerge it under water. Just asking, because it's a "ship" so surely there would be buoyant on the water and it would float, are you preventing this from happening via scripting somehow? If so, damn well done!

Yoou! Why do you have so much power? When I was dabbling with adding effects to the post-bloom.fx I just ended up with either a green or a black screen. Teach me your secrets!! And yes! How is the performance hit?



-Wolf

This.is.madness.

In the overwhelming and positive meaning of that word.

I stand with wolf - please, share your secrets!

you are a mad professor unaware of your gift of power..... you are Cyberman the lord of code

with your magical gift of code can you make callan like me?

also i did have black painted finger nails once but in school holidays ( talking 1986 here ) eye liner, the things you did at school to get female attention.
then i went punk then indie to grunge to indie again to raver then finally to me.

cybernescence,

I have to say this is one of the most unique looking games I have seen. I really like the style of the game. Great job on everything you have done so far. I can't wait to play your game!

Amazing work from top to bottom....GameGuru should be using your video to advertise the power of the engine...I never believed that it had so much power until I saw your work....Again well done will be watching this with great interest !

It just gets better and better this what can i say....love it m8

I played a game on the old C64 many years ago called " The Eidolon "
Kind of reminds me of the style and feeling they went for although there nothing alike
But the instructions were like a manuscript ,,,so much effort back in the day ...

@Landman
Not too bad at all, better than I was expecting about 1-2 FPS drop.
I put some videos in the product chat board, but will also include here, but if you've seen them there they are the same. Thanks for the comments!

EDIT: - one of the videos:



@ wolf
Arrghhh, yes the number of times I got a green screen at first was just not funny . But at least you don't have to restart GG each time to retest, just restart game so not so bad there. The performance hit varies - for the color only effects (no extra samples) I can't detect any change. For those that take samples it varies a lot, but FXAA is one of the lightest, maybe 1 or 2 FPS drop.

@ Ertlov - thanks for the comments, but I just look on with total awe at your achievements and with your Father's Island game. Amazing stuff.

@science boy - thanks much for the comments and re I have a surprise for you coming soon. Stay tuned

@milanko89 - thank you - appreciate the support!

@Stefos - thank you too - it's great to get supportive comments especially during the 'nothings working properly' weeks

@Honkeyboy - thanks - wish I could get as many levels done as you do

@synchromesh - thanks for posting those pictures - I see what you mean, kind of similar vibe . Now that you've posted a 'blueprint' I might be tempted ...

On the shader front, I found something that you might like for GG - it's not exactly C64, but give it a go and see what you think . I would post the full post-sao.fx shader file here but don't like to release TGC IP without permission, so if you're up for a few simple edits ...

Backup the post-sao.fx file in effectbank/reloaded folder.
Open up post-sao.fx with notepad and at the top add:



Then scroll down / find these lines:

float4 PSPresent( output IN, uniform sampler2D srcTex, uniform sampler2D srcTex2, uniform sampler2D srcTex3 ) : COLOR
{

And then insert/add after the curly bracket:



Save it then run GG with a level of your choice, maybe Die Glocke, (make sure SAO intensity slider is not zero). To remove either replace with your back-up or comment out the line at the top i.e. //#define ...

Cheers.

Doesn't look like I have that file ?

@synchromesh - Are you using 1.131? Do you have this in your change log - "Added new POST-SAO.FX to free regular BLOOM shader pass for a much quicker non-SAO rendering" ? Cheers.

Ahh I was still on the beta ( which I assume had been updated to the 131 ..

It Works ..that was great fun !!
A cross between the C64 and running doom on an old 386 ...very cool

Hey Cybernescence, I have never really got into the steampunk thing. But to be honest, this is just awesome and i really want to play this game lol

Thanks cryptweaver!

Work continues on the shaders, hopefully to add something a bit different to the look & feel of the game. A couple of screenshots below, one showing the adaptive DOF - you might see that both the foreground and the background are blurred, whilst the airship is in focus (though not sure if this effect will make into final release) and the next is a happy accident whilst trying to develop volumetric fog - the frosting is applied by an entity shader (this was supposed to be fog, but think it looks pretty good as it is in the correct setting). Cheers.

Very atmospheric! Must be a large game if you aim to have so many climate zones?

Is this primarily about the airships?



-Wolf

Im waiting with anticipation for you to release this m8 it really looks soo good and i kinda like the cyber genre so its right up my street shame that GG hasnt the facility to sell your games would be a nice addon i think, just my personal opinion