[WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Discuss and distribute tools and methods for modding. Moderator - Grognak
Russian Rockman
Posts: 819
Joined: Fri Jan 10, 2014 11:43 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby Russian Rockman » Thu May 01, 2014 5:34 am

I like the "human" sprites, I think they look really good and yes they look very similar to the vanilla ones. Nice work.

I finally got around to trying out the Zoltan C, it has only 2 reactor power to start with and costs 30 scrap to upgrade, it had the "weak system" warning saying it requires additional scrap to upgrade. So if all these ships started out with 0-2 reactor power, combined with the ion storm thing, then you will really consider upgrading other systems before your reactor. ;)
User avatar
Gencool
Posts: 409
Joined: Sun Jun 16, 2013 1:21 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby Gencool » Thu May 01, 2014 9:52 am

a Sir wrote:Alright alright...


Hehheh, sorry! I love it though =D Looks really dynamic!


Also aye, the heads and colours are based on the original sprites (why re-invent the wheel, eh?)

Eyes (and, unfortunately, goggles) are kinda hard to do when the character's face is only 3-3 pixels wide :\

They still look a little top heavy, I may have to move the belt-line up a pixel. Plus the half-helm needs a re-work...
Any other stuff to look at?

Also they're based on some awesome costumes I found. You guys know professor elemental?

Humans.png



Also, a thought; could you use weapon animations to create animated parts of the ship? Like an artillery system that makes the head of the bug lift up and aim?
ImageImageImage
- Gencool (aka Puppetsquid) -- I make weird stuff
Russian Rockman
Posts: 819
Joined: Fri Jan 10, 2014 11:43 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby Russian Rockman » Thu May 01, 2014 4:25 pm

Weapon animations could do something like that... But there's a catch.

During an FTL "jump" weapons are not shown. In addition to that weapons are overlapped by the ship's hull.
This means that weapon animations affecting "parts of the ship" would have to be "in addition" to the main hull (outside of the space it occupies), and they would have to be "small, non essential" details (e.g. Not the entire head of the ship. :P ) because they won't be noticeable when the ship jumps.

One thing that would work though is the different animations for manning stations! I like that idea you can up with. If each "direction", up down left and right had a different animation it could be really neat! All you would have to do is make sure the direction of the stations matched the room image. Since were using 1*2 rooms only that will be interesting.

What I mean is you could have a 1*2 room with a station in the up direction for say, engines, this room image could have some random pumps and levers and other steampunk dewhickies. Every engine room would have its console designated as "up" and so it would use the "up" animation which would really just be a side view animation of the crew working the engines. For a piloting room it could have a wheel at the helm and the terminal could be designated as "down". So then the "down" animation could be of the crew controlling the wheel.
hilariouslijah
Posts: 30
Joined: Sun Mar 30, 2014 12:15 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby hilariouslijah » Fri May 02, 2014 11:56 pm

Those human sprites look so cool. :shock: Perhaps you could have an artillery beam coming out of the wasp's stinger? That would be sort of fun 8-). Keep up the great and awesome work!
Image
a Sir
Posts: 50
Joined: Thu Apr 17, 2014 11:37 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby a Sir » Sat May 03, 2014 3:11 am

I've been a little busy this week, but I'm still working on the mod!

Russian Rockman wrote: So if all these ships started out with 0-2 reactor power, combined with the ion storm thing, then you will really consider upgrading other systems before your reactor. ;)

That's great!

Gencool wrote:
They still look a little top heavy, I may have to move the belt-line up a pixel. Plus the half-helm needs a re-work...
Any other stuff to look at?

Ah yes, I wasn't sure what the half-helm thing was for some time.. Other than that, I think they are perfect! Great job!

Russian Rockman wrote:One thing that would work though is the different animations for manning stations!

I think this could really add more depth in the mod. It would be really fun to see the crews each working with different animations! The maximum number of special animations would be three though... Up/Side/Down, with the default one being the other side.

hilariouslijah wrote: Keep up the great and awesome work!

Thank you!


Unfortunately I wasn't able to make the "steamplane" ship... Every way I tried just didn't come out right. If the size is the same as the airships, then the plane would feel awkward. I tried to make a "squadron" type ship with multiple steamplanes but it didn't quite work well :/ I might try again later...

I did, however, create a new player ship. This one will replace the Crystal ship since it is special, and should be harder to unlock and rarer to meet these kind of ships...

(click for bigger)
Image

...Yes, it's a flying whale. No, I'm not kidding.
Image
User avatar
Gencool
Posts: 409
Joined: Sun Jun 16, 2013 1:21 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby Gencool » Sat May 03, 2014 8:15 am

YES YES YES I LOVE IT :D

Ohman we could make 'lock down' into an oil bomb! Kinda gruesome when used with that ship, I guess, but it actually would make a lot of sense, and means the crystal crew's special power would make them like a jurrasic park Dilophosaurus ^^
ImageImageImage
- Gencool (aka Puppetsquid) -- I make weird stuff
Russian Rockman
Posts: 819
Joined: Fri Jan 10, 2014 11:43 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby Russian Rockman » Sat May 03, 2014 8:17 am

a Sir wrote:...Yes, it's a flying whale. No, I'm not kidding.


Hahahaha :lol:, I love it. It's soo cute!!!

Have you seen those old airships with the 12 wings when that were some of the first ones designed. You could make a steam plane with 4 propellers or something and a LOT of wings stacked on top of one another. That idea actually came from watching Guns of Icarus so maybe you could take some inspiration from there.
User avatar
Gencool
Posts: 409
Joined: Sun Jun 16, 2013 1:21 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby Gencool » Sat May 03, 2014 10:28 pm

So, I tested out a thought I'd had, but it didn't work, and came up with thie attached instead.
The up/down walkcycles have a ladder over the top of the crewmember.
It works surprisingly well, and since the character remains facing forward, the extra frame on the down cycle isn't too noticeable.
There are still issues with 2x2 rooms, made even more noticeable by the ladder, unfortunately.

I can't post the ftl file (no internet still) so you may have to trust me for now, unless anyone wants to write the anim xml and compile it with the steam-mantis .ftl themselves ^^

image.jpg


(Also the the bottom right is an example of actual scale and the base-female overlay)
ImageImageImage
- Gencool (aka Puppetsquid) -- I make weird stuff
Russian Rockman
Posts: 819
Joined: Fri Jan 10, 2014 11:43 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby Russian Rockman » Sat May 03, 2014 10:57 pm

That ladder idea seems like it will work "well enough". They may not be visible all the time, but I could definitely deal with that since the animations will be able to communicate the basic idea that the crew is climbing ladders. Hey, maybe the ladders only appear when the crew is ready to climb. ;)

I think as long as we only use 1x2 rooms everything should be fine. The ship hills won't really be big enough for anything but 1x2 I think.

Is that frame in the bottom left a terminal frame? It looks nice, but it looks like their in a nice comfy office chair rather than working a steam ship. :P

Also, are you "sure" you can't change which image is the standing still one? There are x & y coordinates in the animations.xml file for where on the sheet the frames are located and you can even add longer frames. The standing still animations is just a repetition of one single frame. Anyway, what I mean is are you entirely sure that you can't just add the standing still frame into a blank space on the sheet and change the x and y coordinates in animations.xml?
a Sir
Posts: 50
Joined: Thu Apr 17, 2014 11:37 pm

Re: [WIP] [Steampunk] Lighter than air

Postby a Sir » Sun May 04, 2014 9:36 pm

Gencool wrote:Ohman we could make 'lock down' into an oil bomb! Kinda gruesome when used with that ship, I guess, but it actually would make a lot of sense, and means the crystal crew's special power would make them like a jurrasic park Dilophosaurus ^^


Ohh nice idea! Crystal crew could be oil-dispersing automatons... Sounds pretty awesome.

Russian Rockman wrote:Have you seen those old airships with the 12 wings when that were some of the first ones designed. You could make a steam plane with 4 propellers or something and a LOT of wings stacked on top of one another. That idea actually came from watching Guns of Icarus so maybe you could take some inspiration from there.


Do you mean something like this? Image

And this?

Image

I guess I'll try to make something like that...

Gencool wrote:So, I tested out a thought I'd had, but it didn't work, and came up with thie attached instead.
The up/down walkcycles have a ladder over the top of the crewmember.
It works surprisingly well, and since the character remains facing forward, the extra frame on the down cycle isn't too noticeable.
There are still issues with 2x2 rooms, made even more noticeable by the ladder, unfortunately.

I like everything you've done so far! The sprites look amazing! I think it's pretty smart to include the ladder in the crew animations instead of the rooms... I think it might look pretty nice, and it would give the sensation of the ladders being attached to the cut-off side of the ships.
The ships will probably never have any room sizes 2x2. For system rooms that need more space, they will be 1x3 and 1x3.

Russian Rockman wrote:Is that frame in the bottom left a terminal frame? It looks nice, but it looks like their in a nice comfy office chair rather than working a steam ship. :P


I have to agree with RR here, it looks a bit too comfortable. It might make sense for a pilot to have a chair though...


Here's a teeny tiny luxury ship, that possibly won't be able to house a lot of systems:
Image

That makes 5 enemy ships...
Image