Oolite Bulletins

I was looking at the thread for the planetary rings OXP and there are screenshots showing different colored stars, with this causing some of the rings to be different colors.

I haven't installed any OXPs that change the stars (to my knowledge) and all I ever see are white stars, and some that have a very minor bluish tint to them. Granted, I haven't been to every single system, but I've never seen any stars that have a really noticeable color to them.

Are colored stars only in an OXP, or should I bee seeing them in the core game?

Colored stars can be seen in the core game too. Zaonce, for example, has an intense blue color that tints pretty much everything in the system. The F6 map shows the color of each star.

Unfortunately, version 1.88 has a bug which results in all planet atmospheres being white. If you load up the latest nightly (found here) you will see things as they were intended to be, with the star color affecting the atmosphere as well.

another_commander wrote: ↑Wed Mar 25, 2020 5:31 pm

Colored stars can be seen in the core game too. Zaonce, for example, has an intense blue color that tints pretty much everything in the system. The F6 map shows the color of each star.

Apparently the effect is much more subtle than I thought based on the screenshots in the rings thread. Some of the images in the first post here show very pronounced colors;

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=18921&p=257815

But for me, it's a very slight tint, which is most visible around the edges of the star. And if you turn up the gamma as I had done to 1.4, the color pretty much goes away completely. Even with the gamma turned down to its lowest setting of 0.2, it's still only a pale color.

another_commander wrote: ↑Wed Mar 25, 2020 5:31 pm

Unfortunately, version 1.88 has a bug which results in all planet atmospheres being white. If you load up the latest nightly (found here) you will see things as they were intended to be, with the star color affecting the atmosphere as well.

Thanks. I really wish it was possible to download the game in zipped form.

Rekrul wrote: ↑Wed Mar 25, 2020 9:26 pm

Apparently the effect is much more subtle than I thought based on the screenshots in the rings thread. Some of the images in the first post here show very pronounced colors;

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=18921&p=257815

But for me, it's a very slight tint, which is most visible around the edges of the star. And if you turn up the gamma as I had done to 1.4, the color pretty much goes away completely. Even with the gamma turned down to its lowest setting of 0.2, it's still only a pale color.

The images with intense color are pre-1.86, which had a different, more primitive light model. Anyway, always using Zaonce as an example, it is not the bluest star tint you can obtain. But whatever you do, star colors will probably not look as intense as the ones seen in those pre-1.86 images.

Thanks. I really wish it was possible to download the game in zipped form.

Assuming Windows OS, the nightly installer is already in zipped form (LZMA compression) and can be opened with 7-zip without the need to run it. Once opened, you can select everything inside the $_OUTDIR/oolite.app folder and extract it to your preferred destination. Having said that, the nightly can be installed in parallel with the standard game (on its own folder of course), without having one affecting the other.

another_commander wrote: ↑Wed Mar 25, 2020 10:09 pm

The images with intense color are pre-1.86, which had a different, more primitive light model. Anyway, always using Zaonce as an example, it is not the bluest star tint you can obtain. But whatever you do, star colors will probably not look as intense as the ones seen in those pre-1.86 images.

The more subtle color may be more realistic (I honestly don't know), but I kind of like the more intensely colored stars.

another_commander wrote: ↑Wed Mar 25, 2020 10:09 pm

Assuming Windows OS, the nightly installer is already in zipped form (LZMA compression) and can be opened with 7-zip without the need to run it. Once opened, you can select everything inside the $_OUTDIR/oolite.app folder and extract it to your preferred destination. Having said that, the nightly can be installed in parallel with the standard game (on its own folder of course), without having one affecting the other.

Thanks for telling me this. I had previously tried to extract the EXE file, but I didn't try the 7-Zip GUI. I tried a couple different command line archivers on it, including the latest version of 7z.exe and none of them would recognize it as an archive. Universal Extractor semed to extract it, but botched something as the game wouldn't launch. The 7-Zip GUI version worked fine though. Thanks.

I think I'll stick with 1.88 though, since I don't really see any difference (especially with the gamma increased).

Rekrul wrote: ↑Thu Mar 26, 2020 6:03 am

I think I'll stick with 1.88 though, since I don't really see any difference (especially with the gamma increased).

No difference? I wasn't expecting that, I thought it was more than evident. Anyway, if you try increasing the ambient light (amibient_level setting in planetinfo.plist) not only will you see a difference, but you will witness also the second big planet rendering bug of 1.88. No matter how high the ambient light goes, the dark side of the planet always remains in complete darkness.

another_commander wrote: ↑Thu Mar 26, 2020 6:18 am

No difference? I wasn't expecting that, I thought it was more than evident. Anyway, if you try increasing the ambient light (amibient_level setting in planetinfo.plist) not only will you see a difference, but you will witness also the second big planet rendering bug of 1.88. No matter how high the ambient light goes, the dark side of the planet always remains in complete darkness.

Well, to be honest, I didn't really test it that much. I kind of just loaded it up, looked at a couple stars and saw that they mostly still looked white-ish. I'll give it a more thorough test in a little bit.