Oolite Bulletins

I have only recently gotten this game and I've only been using visual mods so far. I have BGS, which changes the witchspace effect to something that, in my opinion, is the best looking "warp" effect I've ever seen in a game; which is surprising for how simple this one looks.

However, the docking and undocking effect remain normal and it feels weird seeing that simple red rectangle pattern one moment, then seeing the most mind-blowing witchspace effect.

I was wondering if there was any OXP that alters the red rectangle effect when docking and undocking to something more trippy.

PillowTalk wrote:

I have BGS, which changes the witchspace effect to something that, in my opinion, is the best looking "warp" effect I've ever seen in a game...

It is rather splendid, ain't it... and it's subtly different with a mis-jump into interstellar space (here be dragons).

Heh - yes. A nice animation, Thargoid.

I guess it's time to stick my nose into a sequence for main stations.

Svengali wrote:

I guess it's time to stick my nose into a sequence for main stations.

<looks up - grins>

Svengali wrote:

Heh - yes. A nice animation, Thargoid.

I guess it's time to stick my nose into a sequence for main stations.

This would be great, Svengali. The docking/undocking sequence is the single most "basic" looking part of the whole ooniverse.

Cody wrote:

Svengali wrote:

I guess it's time to stick my nose into a sequence for main stations.

<looks up - grins>

<Looks across the bar and notices Cody grinning at something ...... also grins>

Svengali wrote:

Heh - yes. A nice animation, Thargoid.

I guess it's time to stick my nose into a sequence for main stations.

It should be, you were rather instrumental in it

A generic sequence is not so easy though. We have ~2.5 seconds for this thing and we can't use the player ship. It should be relative simple to keep setup costs/time low and the displayed stuff must work for different types of stations and playerships.

A interesting (and challenging) approach could be to use a plain quad and do all shiny things via textures + shader. This would also allow more advanced techniques and keeps the implementation simple - although the different view_positions can't be handled yet - hmm.

Even a basic animation showing metal walls and intermittent strip-lighting going by would be a huge improvement - maybe (if there's time) with a big set of interlocking doors opening ... I'd prefer if it didn't show the player ship from the outside, though: I think whatever is shown should be from the cockpit point of view.

I second Disembodied's thoughts..

Thargoid wrote:

That's exactly what the docking effect for the Aquarian HQ is. But something like that used more generally risks a mismatch between what you see during docking and launch with what is actually visible on the station model itself when you approach.

True ... is there a possibility to allow stations to define custom docking sequence animations? So - to pick an entirely random example - some evil piece of Bug technology into which one might have to effect an uninvited ingress, say, could show the player, on docking, a set of lurid green ribbed walls and sinister shadowy shapes, or somesuch ...

Difficult, isn't it?

Disembodied wrote:

Thargoid wrote:

That's exactly what the docking effect for the Aquarian HQ is. But something like that used more generally risks a mismatch between what you see during docking and launch with what is actually visible on the station model itself when you approach.

True ... is there a possibility to allow stations to define custom docking sequence animations? So - to pick an entirely random example - some evil piece of Bug technology into which one might have to effect an uninvited egress, say, could show the player, on docking, a set of lurid green ribbed walls and sinister shadowy shapes, or somesuch ...

Custom sequences should be possible, showing the playership is not possible.

Svengali wrote:

... showing the playership is not possible.

That's fine by me...

Disembodied wrote:

I think whatever is shown should be from the cockpit point of view.

... agreed!