Well it seems that sometime those final few steps are the hardest to take!
Those <expletive> blue stars in the intro have certainly done their best to trip me up during testing over the past couple of days, but I think I've finally hit upon a build where they seem to be relatively well behaved...
So... what am I saying?
Could it be that v1.10 is finally "out there?"
YES! Indeed it is!!!
The download and nanite2000's texture sets are both available at SpaceSimCentral (SSC) and Elite-Games.Ru.
For downloading from SSC, please see this page for the patch, and for nanite2000's texture packs: Enhanced planet surfaces, Enhanced metal surfaces and Cockpit icons and Planetary information graphics.
For downloading from Elite-Games.Ru, please see this post for the patch, and this post for the texture packs.
There is an album of images for each of nanite2000's texture packs here.
Well there are far too many fixes & enhancements to list here in a single post, it has been a bit of a monster update over v1.09b ... so after such a long wait, I really hope that you'll all enjoy playing this latest version
I would just like to add some personal thank-you's:
Firstly to nanite2000 for all the time and effort he's put into creating the new texture packs for this latest build, and for putting up with me creating yet another terrain area that he can add a texture to, just when he thought he was done
And also a very big thanks to Steve of FrontierAstro for all of the time that he's spent testing the never-ending builds & texture packs, and for feeding back both bugs and suggestions to get them to where they're at today. (And there's an alternate final docking bay room in this build that may well be a rescued model thanks to Steve and his extensive FFE/FFED3D archive!)
A big thanks to both of you guys!
Those <expletive> blue stars in the intro have certainly done their best to trip me up during testing over the past couple of days, but I think I've finally hit upon a build where they seem to be relatively well behaved...
So... what am I saying?
Could it be that v1.10 is finally "out there?"
YES! Indeed it is!!!
The download and nanite2000's texture sets are both available at SpaceSimCentral (SSC) and Elite-Games.Ru.
For downloading from SSC, please see this page for the patch, and for nanite2000's texture packs: Enhanced planet surfaces, Enhanced metal surfaces and Cockpit icons and Planetary information graphics.
For downloading from Elite-Games.Ru, please see this post for the patch, and this post for the texture packs.
There is an album of images for each of nanite2000's texture packs here.
Well there are far too many fixes & enhancements to list here in a single post, it has been a bit of a monster update over v1.09b ... so after such a long wait, I really hope that you'll all enjoy playing this latest version
I would just like to add some personal thank-you's:
Firstly to nanite2000 for all the time and effort he's put into creating the new texture packs for this latest build, and for putting up with me creating yet another terrain area that he can add a texture to, just when he thought he was done
And also a very big thanks to Steve of FrontierAstro for all of the time that he's spent testing the never-ending builds & texture packs, and for feeding back both bugs and suggestions to get them to where they're at today. (And there's an alternate final docking bay room in this build that may well be a rescued model thanks to Steve and his extensive FFE/FFED3D archive!)
A big thanks to both of you guys!
Last edited:
2014-10-17 v1.10 change log - part 1...
• Object rendition code reworked to distance-sort draw all objects, not just planetary/orbital bodies when within a sky. This greatly improves z-order and planets generally draw in front of each other in the correct order.
• Transparent areas on models, such as the cockpit on the replacement Falcon model will now correctly show any other ships and objects that are behind it. Depth sorting can be disabled by setting sortByDistance=0 in the config file.
• Z-Depth issues fixed where planets converge at the same position. Thanks to DreamZzz for contacting me to let me know about a model variable that could be tested to perform z-buffer clears. This is applied for asteroid, planet and planetary ring objects during the sorted render phase.
• Choice of Accurate or Artistic drawing of the planets when within an atmosphere. Setting DrawPlanetsInSkyLate=0 draws planets outside of the atmosphere and they will be obsured/coloured by it. (default)
• Setting DrawPlanetsInSkyLate=1 will draws planets inside the atmosphere so that they are always visible in the sky, but appear behind any clouds.
• Default value for DrawSunsInSkyLate has changed to 0, so that clouds can mask the sun.
• FFE code now exposes a pointer to the parent object of the orbital paths, these can now be drawn at the same point as the parent, and whilst they can still overlap the parent - closer objects will be drawn in front using depth sort.
• Fixed the extra rotation applied to asteroids and brown dwarfs when the view was moved left/right.
• Brown Dwarf planets no longer have invisible areas when in close proximity to them.
• Brown Dwarf is now drawn behind clouds in a planet's sky as per other orbitals/planetary bodies.
• New option to draw the original FFE nebula textures in space rather than FFED3D's skybox. Set drawOriginalNebula=1
• in ffed3daj.cfg to enable (default) or drawOriginalNebula=0 to disable.
• New option to draw the FFED3D nebula skybox or suppress it. Set drawFFED3DNebula=1 in ffed3daj.cfg to draw it or drawFFED3DNebula=0 to disable it (default).
• JJFFE fix: Intro uses the active Space background colour rather than resetting to light blue each time.
• If drawing the FFED3D nebula skybox then its images (skybox0 to 5) must be transparent for this to take effect, otherwise it should be disabled. The original textures in FFED3D v1.12b++ had a solid background.
• Remapped the nova images used by the sector star map to use tex553 and tex554. This separates them from those used on the original FFF nova background drawn in space and during the intro sequence.
• Suppressed loading of external models 315, 316 and 444 which interfered with the original nebula/stars background.
• Suppressed drawing of the original Imperial engine pods which were appearing over the replacement model for the Imperial Trader.
• Fixed vertex colour bleed between land/sea terrain for planet #128.
• Intro fix: Turner's Quest and Police ship don't reappear once destroyed by the Thargoid warship.
• The Defence satellite now uses unique image tex555 for its solar panels instead of tex452.
• The 'Game Over' headstone now uses tex556 instead of tex422 (used by ships engine pods & fuel scoops).
• Planetary rings are now slightly transparent. This can be adjusted with the setting PlanetRingsAlpha.
• Rivers, lakes and pools are now textured. (experimental, doesn't use a water shader yet)
• Optional FFE fix to activate multiple textures on primitive Adder, Cobra Mk1 and Constrictor models. There was a command to select a variable texture but this wasn't actually used when the model was drawn. Enabled by default, but it can be disabled by setting "fixMultiTexturesOnShips=0" in ffed3daj.cfg.
• Terrain draws correctly in Battle Computer mode and doesn't have splits and triangles missing.
• Keyboard binds now include keys for triggering menu options 1 to 4.
• New patch to prevent accidental firing of lasers when using the cabin screens, e.g. sector map, planetary view. In [PATCHES] section of ffed3daj.cfg, set BlockLaserFireFromCabin=1 to enable (default) or set =0 to disable the patch and restore original FFE behaviour.
• Tidy up of render/sampler state code. Texture clamping is now always used and removes visible seams/edges from the Combat Computer grid, nebula on system charts and large sun image on information screens.
• Combat Computer grid is now drawn last of all so that it doesn't clip/obscure engine flares, lights etc.
• Removed the underlying FFE assembly code which drew the Cabin background when using the Combat Computer view.
• New configuration setting "extendedDetailDistances" which extends the draw distances for object details. Set =1 by default to enable, set this option to 0 to disable if frame rates suffer on less powerful computers as it can introduce many additional objects to large space ports and city areas.
• New configuration setting "linkTargetSpritesToLabels" which is enabled by default and links the display of navigation target markers to the display of descriptive labels within the game view. The markers appear for objects that are beyond visual range. Objects that do not have descriptions, e.g. asteroids will just display their marker.
• The planetary view is unaffected by this and will continue to show markers for bases, stations and planets. set to 1 to enable, set to 0 to disable.
• Primitive 'Ball' objects are now drawn with shading, for example Lifter cargo, Pilot heads, Mantis spaceship.
• Spheres use pre-calculated values to generate vertices.
• Issue of disappearing button icons in Stock market screen is now fixed.
• The double asteroid, model #116 is now drawn as 2 separate asteroidal bodies. This is still 'work in progress' as the position & rotation are incorrect, and the target marker should be centred between the 2 asteroids.
• Added information message when aborting start up due to another FFED3DAJ process being active.
• Added error message when invalid config file is specified on command line.
• Additional enhancements for planet terrain re-texturing:
• New terrain areas "shoreToLand", "RockyPlain" and "HighSlope". Corrected support for "highPlain" area.
• New terrain options to sphere-map the texture on flat land areas (plains/dry ocean regions) rather than using the default FFE mappings. This consistently orients and scales the texture across large areas. Each mapped terrain area also has a setting to control how the texture is scaled.
Please see the readme file for more information on terrain re-texturing.
• Transparent areas on models, such as the cockpit on the replacement Falcon model will now correctly show any other ships and objects that are behind it. Depth sorting can be disabled by setting sortByDistance=0 in the config file.
• Z-Depth issues fixed where planets converge at the same position. Thanks to DreamZzz for contacting me to let me know about a model variable that could be tested to perform z-buffer clears. This is applied for asteroid, planet and planetary ring objects during the sorted render phase.
• Choice of Accurate or Artistic drawing of the planets when within an atmosphere. Setting DrawPlanetsInSkyLate=0 draws planets outside of the atmosphere and they will be obsured/coloured by it. (default)
• Setting DrawPlanetsInSkyLate=1 will draws planets inside the atmosphere so that they are always visible in the sky, but appear behind any clouds.
• Default value for DrawSunsInSkyLate has changed to 0, so that clouds can mask the sun.
• FFE code now exposes a pointer to the parent object of the orbital paths, these can now be drawn at the same point as the parent, and whilst they can still overlap the parent - closer objects will be drawn in front using depth sort.
• Fixed the extra rotation applied to asteroids and brown dwarfs when the view was moved left/right.
• Brown Dwarf planets no longer have invisible areas when in close proximity to them.
• Brown Dwarf is now drawn behind clouds in a planet's sky as per other orbitals/planetary bodies.
• New option to draw the original FFE nebula textures in space rather than FFED3D's skybox. Set drawOriginalNebula=1
• in ffed3daj.cfg to enable (default) or drawOriginalNebula=0 to disable.
• New option to draw the FFED3D nebula skybox or suppress it. Set drawFFED3DNebula=1 in ffed3daj.cfg to draw it or drawFFED3DNebula=0 to disable it (default).
• JJFFE fix: Intro uses the active Space background colour rather than resetting to light blue each time.
• If drawing the FFED3D nebula skybox then its images (skybox0 to 5) must be transparent for this to take effect, otherwise it should be disabled. The original textures in FFED3D v1.12b++ had a solid background.
• Remapped the nova images used by the sector star map to use tex553 and tex554. This separates them from those used on the original FFF nova background drawn in space and during the intro sequence.
• Suppressed loading of external models 315, 316 and 444 which interfered with the original nebula/stars background.
• Suppressed drawing of the original Imperial engine pods which were appearing over the replacement model for the Imperial Trader.
• Fixed vertex colour bleed between land/sea terrain for planet #128.
• Intro fix: Turner's Quest and Police ship don't reappear once destroyed by the Thargoid warship.
• The Defence satellite now uses unique image tex555 for its solar panels instead of tex452.
• The 'Game Over' headstone now uses tex556 instead of tex422 (used by ships engine pods & fuel scoops).
• Planetary rings are now slightly transparent. This can be adjusted with the setting PlanetRingsAlpha.
• Rivers, lakes and pools are now textured. (experimental, doesn't use a water shader yet)
• Optional FFE fix to activate multiple textures on primitive Adder, Cobra Mk1 and Constrictor models. There was a command to select a variable texture but this wasn't actually used when the model was drawn. Enabled by default, but it can be disabled by setting "fixMultiTexturesOnShips=0" in ffed3daj.cfg.
• Terrain draws correctly in Battle Computer mode and doesn't have splits and triangles missing.
• Keyboard binds now include keys for triggering menu options 1 to 4.
• New patch to prevent accidental firing of lasers when using the cabin screens, e.g. sector map, planetary view. In [PATCHES] section of ffed3daj.cfg, set BlockLaserFireFromCabin=1 to enable (default) or set =0 to disable the patch and restore original FFE behaviour.
• Tidy up of render/sampler state code. Texture clamping is now always used and removes visible seams/edges from the Combat Computer grid, nebula on system charts and large sun image on information screens.
• Combat Computer grid is now drawn last of all so that it doesn't clip/obscure engine flares, lights etc.
• Removed the underlying FFE assembly code which drew the Cabin background when using the Combat Computer view.
• New configuration setting "extendedDetailDistances" which extends the draw distances for object details. Set =1 by default to enable, set this option to 0 to disable if frame rates suffer on less powerful computers as it can introduce many additional objects to large space ports and city areas.
• New configuration setting "linkTargetSpritesToLabels" which is enabled by default and links the display of navigation target markers to the display of descriptive labels within the game view. The markers appear for objects that are beyond visual range. Objects that do not have descriptions, e.g. asteroids will just display their marker.
• The planetary view is unaffected by this and will continue to show markers for bases, stations and planets. set to 1 to enable, set to 0 to disable.
• Primitive 'Ball' objects are now drawn with shading, for example Lifter cargo, Pilot heads, Mantis spaceship.
• Spheres use pre-calculated values to generate vertices.
• Issue of disappearing button icons in Stock market screen is now fixed.
• The double asteroid, model #116 is now drawn as 2 separate asteroidal bodies. This is still 'work in progress' as the position & rotation are incorrect, and the target marker should be centred between the 2 asteroids.
• Added information message when aborting start up due to another FFED3DAJ process being active.
• Added error message when invalid config file is specified on command line.
• Additional enhancements for planet terrain re-texturing:
• New terrain areas "shoreToLand", "RockyPlain" and "HighSlope". Corrected support for "highPlain" area.
• New terrain options to sphere-map the texture on flat land areas (plains/dry ocean regions) rather than using the default FFE mappings. This consistently orients and scales the texture across large areas. Each mapped terrain area also has a setting to control how the texture is scaled.
Please see the readme file for more information on terrain re-texturing.
2014-10-17 v1.10 change log - part 2...
• "Living" planets can now use an enhanced atmosphere shader.
The shader is derived from Alex Peterson's "Simple Flexibile Atmosphere Shader" which can be found on his blog at http://petrocket.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/simple-flexibile-atmosphere-shaders.html
Full credit and thanks to him for sharing his work with the internet community.
• Gas giants and irregular planets have a new atmosphere glow surrounding them. The new atmosphere effects are enabled or disabled by the .cfg setting "useEnhancedAtmosphereShaders"
• Atmosphere colour images and settings are exposed via the texture configuration file.
• Cloud texture mapping corrected so that it doesn't skip at midnight and does a full rotation per day.
• Animated the cloud texture so that it moves for planets displayed in the planetary view.
• Alpha blending corrected on cloud layers so that they don't discolour the sky. (Additive blending)
• Cloud layers appear beneath the ship when ascending from the planet, they don't just disappear.
• Reworked the reading of configuration files so that they are all processed before the game window displays. This has resolved the issue where the game would silently fail to start up.
• Extra external cloud textures configurable via textures.cfg
• Planet surface 'fog' settings added via textures.cfg which can colour the planet terrain to imitate the effect of atmosphere fog when flying higher into and beyond the atmosphere.
• Planet surface 'glow' settings to adjust colour added via textures.cfg, primarily to increase red tint on the Brown Dwarf planets when the player gets closer to the surface.
• Space dust is visible again at high speeds and away from space stations. It is also correctly coloured grey rather than white. There is a new setting in the .cfg file to adjust its scale from 0 to 100%.
• The default is starDustScale=100 for full size. Setting the value to 0 will prevent star dust from being drawn and is independent of the FFE game setting (within 'Other') which turns off other game details such as clouds.
• Textures folder can be defined in the [DIR] section of the configuration file.
• Resolved the occasional crashes that occurred when shutting down the game.
• Fixed the blank area on textured planets/asteroids. The sphere-mapping code didn't test for out-of-bounds values being passed into the acos() functions, the values had been caused by rounding errors.
• Added a "borderless" window mode that can be used as an alternative to the "exclusive" fullscreen mode. This new mode will draw a full-screen window on the primary monitor without borders/title, and permits applications on other monitors to be viewed/clicked upon. Borderless mode is enabled by setting "enableBorderless=1" in the configuration file and fullscreen=0. The user can toggle between it and windowed mode as before. With this option enabled the game can be started in this mode by setting "defaultBorderless=1". This will be the new default mode as it automatically runs full-screen without the user having to edit anything.
• When using special CTRL key functionality, the key presses won't be passed through to FFE now. So for example, CTRL+F12 to toggle between full-screen/windowed mode won't activate an escape pod!
• Experimental texture load settings have been added to the .cfg file to permit the loading of game textures directly onto the graphics card rather than into system memory. Users on 32bit Windows who have large amounts of graphics memory available may benefit by being able shift textures to the graphics card. Currently there is no analysis of what can be loaded, the user will need to experiment themselves to find what works.
NB. Switching between fullscreen and windowed mode will take slightly longer when caching directly on the graphics card as they have to be released and reloaded in order to switch resolution/mode.
• Fixed occasional start-up crash when JJFFE read the configuration file to get the FPS limit value.
• At a certain rotational point and distance, small planetoids such as Io would spike areas of their surface out towards the camera. There was an undocumented fix in the FFED3D code base between r58 and r60 which actually fixed this and so it has been added back in. It is skipped for asteroids though as it prevents large portions of their surfaces from being drawn.
• Fixed a situation that displayed a combined external and primitive model for the Eagle Mk 2 or Mk 3. This would happen when drawing external .x models, and model 24/25 is not present but model 23 is. Model 23 would be drawn as it is a common model part but it would display .x Long Range Eagle model with vector landing gear. If model 23 is being drawn as a sub-object and the parent model 24/25 has not been loaded or is missing it will be forced to draw as the primitive model instead.
• Added CTRL+F3 key combination to reload game and ship patches to aid developers making alterations.
• Added CTRL+F7 key combination to reload game textures to aid developers making alterations.
• Added additional ship patches to restore the rear view so that it isn't blocked by the ship model.
• When using grey-scaled shoreline textures on green living planets, it can use vertex blending to create a beach effect. This is enabled by the ffed3daj.cfg configuration setting useVertexBlendingForBeaches=1.
• Setting it to 0 will cause a solid green shoreline texture as in v1.09 and earlier. Has no effect when using pre-coloured textures.
• Initial splash screen will redraw the text and not remain blank after user switches screen mode or after the DirectX display device has had to be reset.
• Bug Fix: Sub-Objects are lit once again by the lights of their parent object (broken in v1.08+)
• Static interplanetary shuttles are now above ground and won't display their base name as the ship label.
• The replacement docking bay entrance now uses a unique model for the cylindrical space station which has a slanted front opening, model 470. Other stations use the squared version, model 227 which is scaled as required to fit the other stations. Both models have been updated to remove the second 'lift' room which should not have been present behind the rear bay doors. The updated models, skin and tris.ini files are included in the patch.
• Added animation timings for the docking bay replacement model so that the doors open and shut correctly.
• Supressed the loading of replacement models for the docking bay lift and two complex areas which are parents to variations of other shapes and models. Models 234, 236 and 237 will not be loaded now.
• Added unique texture for internal docking bay doors, tex557. This is only used along with the replacement docking bay models 227/470 to blend transitions.
• Added unique textures for the docking bay lift model 236. These are used with the replacement docking bay, model 227/470 to blend transitions between rooms. The new textures are tex558 to tex564.
• Police Vipers in the intro sequence now start in front of the space station in scene 11. They don't fly through the front walls as they give chase!
• Z-Order tweaks to TV/Posters so that text overlaps in the correct order.
• Clock faces now appear on all sides of the original FFE church tower, but the hands still spin too fast.
• Corrected alignment of Boa decal stripes.
• Crew icon now appears on the cockpit panel when using a single person ship but have retained crew either by changing ships in Buffet or from using the patch to keep excess crew.
• Updated splash screens for FFED3DAJ mod and removed outdated website links.
• Additional start-up "tips" & tweaked positions. (Thanks for those provided by Steve of FrontierAstro)
• fixed FFE's missing alignment for surface temperature in planet information text.
• The cargo inventory icon is hidden when the ship is empty.
• Improved z-order of TV screens/posters so that they don't disappear when launching from the docking bay.
• Choice between 2 models to use for the space-station docking bay final room and for that of underground stations.
• Two new settings define which to use: "spacestationDockingBay" and "undergroundDockingBay". These can be set to either 233 or 471. If Model 233 is used for the underground room then the animation is set to display a blank frame outside the windows so that the rotating stars aren't visible. Models 233 and 471 are included within the patch package to ensure that they are as expected.
• Added image tex427 to the core files pack as it is used by adverts and was missing from some installations.
• Added images tex529 and tex530 to the core files pack to correct how they are displayed.
• tex529 is the Recycle image, this version is darker than in some installations.
• tex530 is the Frontier logo, forced red in this version to display on the game-over headstone.
• Suppressed the drawing of Space Dust when still within a planet's atmosphere.
• Main shader files now reside in the \Shaders sub-directory.
• The blue explosion stars in the intro sequences rotate.
The shader is derived from Alex Peterson's "Simple Flexibile Atmosphere Shader" which can be found on his blog at http://petrocket.blogspot.co.uk/2010/01/simple-flexibile-atmosphere-shaders.html
Full credit and thanks to him for sharing his work with the internet community.
• Gas giants and irregular planets have a new atmosphere glow surrounding them. The new atmosphere effects are enabled or disabled by the .cfg setting "useEnhancedAtmosphereShaders"
• Atmosphere colour images and settings are exposed via the texture configuration file.
• Cloud texture mapping corrected so that it doesn't skip at midnight and does a full rotation per day.
• Animated the cloud texture so that it moves for planets displayed in the planetary view.
• Alpha blending corrected on cloud layers so that they don't discolour the sky. (Additive blending)
• Cloud layers appear beneath the ship when ascending from the planet, they don't just disappear.
• Reworked the reading of configuration files so that they are all processed before the game window displays. This has resolved the issue where the game would silently fail to start up.
• Extra external cloud textures configurable via textures.cfg
• Planet surface 'fog' settings added via textures.cfg which can colour the planet terrain to imitate the effect of atmosphere fog when flying higher into and beyond the atmosphere.
• Planet surface 'glow' settings to adjust colour added via textures.cfg, primarily to increase red tint on the Brown Dwarf planets when the player gets closer to the surface.
• Space dust is visible again at high speeds and away from space stations. It is also correctly coloured grey rather than white. There is a new setting in the .cfg file to adjust its scale from 0 to 100%.
• The default is starDustScale=100 for full size. Setting the value to 0 will prevent star dust from being drawn and is independent of the FFE game setting (within 'Other') which turns off other game details such as clouds.
• Textures folder can be defined in the [DIR] section of the configuration file.
• Resolved the occasional crashes that occurred when shutting down the game.
• Fixed the blank area on textured planets/asteroids. The sphere-mapping code didn't test for out-of-bounds values being passed into the acos() functions, the values had been caused by rounding errors.
• Added a "borderless" window mode that can be used as an alternative to the "exclusive" fullscreen mode. This new mode will draw a full-screen window on the primary monitor without borders/title, and permits applications on other monitors to be viewed/clicked upon. Borderless mode is enabled by setting "enableBorderless=1" in the configuration file and fullscreen=0. The user can toggle between it and windowed mode as before. With this option enabled the game can be started in this mode by setting "defaultBorderless=1". This will be the new default mode as it automatically runs full-screen without the user having to edit anything.
• When using special CTRL key functionality, the key presses won't be passed through to FFE now. So for example, CTRL+F12 to toggle between full-screen/windowed mode won't activate an escape pod!
• Experimental texture load settings have been added to the .cfg file to permit the loading of game textures directly onto the graphics card rather than into system memory. Users on 32bit Windows who have large amounts of graphics memory available may benefit by being able shift textures to the graphics card. Currently there is no analysis of what can be loaded, the user will need to experiment themselves to find what works.
NB. Switching between fullscreen and windowed mode will take slightly longer when caching directly on the graphics card as they have to be released and reloaded in order to switch resolution/mode.
• Fixed occasional start-up crash when JJFFE read the configuration file to get the FPS limit value.
• At a certain rotational point and distance, small planetoids such as Io would spike areas of their surface out towards the camera. There was an undocumented fix in the FFED3D code base between r58 and r60 which actually fixed this and so it has been added back in. It is skipped for asteroids though as it prevents large portions of their surfaces from being drawn.
• Fixed a situation that displayed a combined external and primitive model for the Eagle Mk 2 or Mk 3. This would happen when drawing external .x models, and model 24/25 is not present but model 23 is. Model 23 would be drawn as it is a common model part but it would display .x Long Range Eagle model with vector landing gear. If model 23 is being drawn as a sub-object and the parent model 24/25 has not been loaded or is missing it will be forced to draw as the primitive model instead.
• Added CTRL+F3 key combination to reload game and ship patches to aid developers making alterations.
• Added CTRL+F7 key combination to reload game textures to aid developers making alterations.
• Added additional ship patches to restore the rear view so that it isn't blocked by the ship model.
• When using grey-scaled shoreline textures on green living planets, it can use vertex blending to create a beach effect. This is enabled by the ffed3daj.cfg configuration setting useVertexBlendingForBeaches=1.
• Setting it to 0 will cause a solid green shoreline texture as in v1.09 and earlier. Has no effect when using pre-coloured textures.
• Initial splash screen will redraw the text and not remain blank after user switches screen mode or after the DirectX display device has had to be reset.
• Bug Fix: Sub-Objects are lit once again by the lights of their parent object (broken in v1.08+)
• Static interplanetary shuttles are now above ground and won't display their base name as the ship label.
• The replacement docking bay entrance now uses a unique model for the cylindrical space station which has a slanted front opening, model 470. Other stations use the squared version, model 227 which is scaled as required to fit the other stations. Both models have been updated to remove the second 'lift' room which should not have been present behind the rear bay doors. The updated models, skin and tris.ini files are included in the patch.
• Added animation timings for the docking bay replacement model so that the doors open and shut correctly.
• Supressed the loading of replacement models for the docking bay lift and two complex areas which are parents to variations of other shapes and models. Models 234, 236 and 237 will not be loaded now.
• Added unique texture for internal docking bay doors, tex557. This is only used along with the replacement docking bay models 227/470 to blend transitions.
• Added unique textures for the docking bay lift model 236. These are used with the replacement docking bay, model 227/470 to blend transitions between rooms. The new textures are tex558 to tex564.
• Police Vipers in the intro sequence now start in front of the space station in scene 11. They don't fly through the front walls as they give chase!
• Z-Order tweaks to TV/Posters so that text overlaps in the correct order.
• Clock faces now appear on all sides of the original FFE church tower, but the hands still spin too fast.
• Corrected alignment of Boa decal stripes.
• Crew icon now appears on the cockpit panel when using a single person ship but have retained crew either by changing ships in Buffet or from using the patch to keep excess crew.
• Updated splash screens for FFED3DAJ mod and removed outdated website links.
• Additional start-up "tips" & tweaked positions. (Thanks for those provided by Steve of FrontierAstro)
• fixed FFE's missing alignment for surface temperature in planet information text.
• The cargo inventory icon is hidden when the ship is empty.
• Improved z-order of TV screens/posters so that they don't disappear when launching from the docking bay.
• Choice between 2 models to use for the space-station docking bay final room and for that of underground stations.
• Two new settings define which to use: "spacestationDockingBay" and "undergroundDockingBay". These can be set to either 233 or 471. If Model 233 is used for the underground room then the animation is set to display a blank frame outside the windows so that the rotating stars aren't visible. Models 233 and 471 are included within the patch package to ensure that they are as expected.
• Added image tex427 to the core files pack as it is used by adverts and was missing from some installations.
• Added images tex529 and tex530 to the core files pack to correct how they are displayed.
• tex529 is the Recycle image, this version is darker than in some installations.
• tex530 is the Frontier logo, forced red in this version to display on the game-over headstone.
• Suppressed the drawing of Space Dust when still within a planet's atmosphere.
• Main shader files now reside in the \Shaders sub-directory.
• The blue explosion stars in the intro sequences rotate.
Last edited:
Running into some model/texture weirdness in the intro, on the station. At first I thought part of it might have to do with my resolution (2560x1440), but when I lowered to 1920x1080, I got the same thing.
2 screenshots:
http://i.imgur.com/qeNcHmA.png
http://i.imgur.com/XEr4Nxj.jpg
Any idea what I broke?
2 screenshots:
http://i.imgur.com/qeNcHmA.png
http://i.imgur.com/XEr4Nxj.jpg
Any idea what I broke?
Hey Donik, It's more the case of what have I broken ...
Sorry about that. Please can you check if you have the sub-directory Models\77\skinpack\1024? I'm guessing not...
Hopefully, you DO have the Models\77 folder with a model in it?
This is the central section of the Hammer station.
The intro uses duplicate models for the intro Hammer stations and I'm remapping them to use the game version for the central section & the arms so that it appears.
The default skin.png for model 77 was a large 2048x2048 image that frequently fails to load, so if you take a look in skins.ini with notepad, it's attempting instead to load the one from skinpack\1024 instead.
There's perhaps an issue with this 'fix' - so please could you let me know if you have model subfolder 77 & what's inside it? Also what 'base' installation pack of files are you using to play with?
Either rename the skins.ini file that's within it to something else or correct the file it's assigning to skin=.....
I'd perhaps better remove the skin.ini from the corefiles .zip if it's going to cause issues...
Cheers, and apologies for the inconvenience!
AndyJ
[edit] hmmm... actually, not sure that it is the skins.ini causing the issue as a quick test & code-check shows that it should fall-back to the standard texture file skin.png anyway if it can't load the one defined in the .ini.
It seems more likely that folder 77 or the model.x is either missing or can't be loaded for some reason, which is odd as you have the 'arms' of the model displaying :S
Sorry about that. Please can you check if you have the sub-directory Models\77\skinpack\1024? I'm guessing not...
Hopefully, you DO have the Models\77 folder with a model in it?
This is the central section of the Hammer station.
The intro uses duplicate models for the intro Hammer stations and I'm remapping them to use the game version for the central section & the arms so that it appears.
The default skin.png for model 77 was a large 2048x2048 image that frequently fails to load, so if you take a look in skins.ini with notepad, it's attempting instead to load the one from skinpack\1024 instead.
There's perhaps an issue with this 'fix' - so please could you let me know if you have model subfolder 77 & what's inside it? Also what 'base' installation pack of files are you using to play with?
Either rename the skins.ini file that's within it to something else or correct the file it's assigning to skin=.....
I'd perhaps better remove the skin.ini from the corefiles .zip if it's going to cause issues...
Cheers, and apologies for the inconvenience!
AndyJ
[edit] hmmm... actually, not sure that it is the skins.ini causing the issue as a quick test & code-check shows that it should fall-back to the standard texture file skin.png anyway if it can't load the one defined in the .ini.
It seems more likely that folder 77 or the model.x is either missing or can't be loaded for some reason, which is odd as you have the 'arms' of the model displaying :S
Last edited:
AndyJ,
In an attempt to fix this, I've started a brand new install without any of my tweaks, same issue.
I'm using the FFED3D_Complete.7z package, with your zips over top as well as nanite's textures. Also using Steve's cockpit and crosshairs. I've disabled any other mods for now.
I am looking at \FFED3D\Models\77 - That's all I have. Inside of \77\ is a skins.ini, but that's it.
No \skinpack\1024
I'm going to tear open FFED3D_Complete.7z and see if I can't find the additional things you're talking about.
Edit: FFED3D_Complete.7z doesn't have the \77\ folder. Going to tear through your zips now
Edit2: FFED3dAJ_v1.01_ExampleSkins.zip and FFED3DAJ_v1.10_CoreFiles.zip both have a \77\ folder with a skins.ini file inside, but that's it. No \skinpack\1024.
I'm downloading Ittiz copy right now, to see what's in there.
In an attempt to fix this, I've started a brand new install without any of my tweaks, same issue.
I'm using the FFED3D_Complete.7z package, with your zips over top as well as nanite's textures. Also using Steve's cockpit and crosshairs. I've disabled any other mods for now.
I am looking at \FFED3D\Models\77 - That's all I have. Inside of \77\ is a skins.ini, but that's it.
No \skinpack\1024
I'm going to tear open FFED3D_Complete.7z and see if I can't find the additional things you're talking about.
Edit: FFED3D_Complete.7z doesn't have the \77\ folder. Going to tear through your zips now
Edit2: FFED3dAJ_v1.01_ExampleSkins.zip and FFED3DAJ_v1.10_CoreFiles.zip both have a \77\ folder with a skins.ini file inside, but that's it. No \skinpack\1024.
I'm downloading Ittiz copy right now, to see what's in there.
Last edited:
If you have model 74 present then you can copy that into 77, it's a duplicate - or would have been.
I know historically there are issues with the elite-forever pack having old, missing or disabled models. If you're using that, run the mod enabler (gsme.exe) and activate the a axblade station, or look in the mods subfolder for it.
Perhaps I should simply add it into the core files pack as I've done with the docking bays.
If you could confirm the original pack you installed over, it'll help if anyone else runs into the same thing.
Cheers!
AndyJ
I know historically there are issues with the elite-forever pack having old, missing or disabled models. If you're using that, run the mod enabler (gsme.exe) and activate the a axblade station, or look in the mods subfolder for it.
Perhaps I should simply add it into the core files pack as I've done with the docking bays.
If you could confirm the original pack you installed over, it'll help if anyone else runs into the same thing.
Cheers!
AndyJ
Quick Post since you're online:
My base is:
http://spacesimcentral.com/ssc/files/file/825-ffed3d-complete7z/
I'm looking into your other suggestions right now.
After enabling axblade station in JSGME - I have the subfolders under Models\77\ now, and I also have a \74\ folder now as well. However, I still have the issue present with my screenshots I've posted above, just with a skinned station. I'm going to check over my CFG file to see If I may have enabled something I shouldn't have.
Edit: CFG File looks OK, tried a stock CFG and same issue. I downloaded Ittiz version and ran it stock. While the intro was completely screwy, the station model was correct. I then applied your+nanite zips to it, station model looks as shown in my screenshots above again. Very strange!
My base is:
http://spacesimcentral.com/ssc/files/file/825-ffed3d-complete7z/
I'm looking into your other suggestions right now.
After enabling axblade station in JSGME - I have the subfolders under Models\77\ now, and I also have a \74\ folder now as well. However, I still have the issue present with my screenshots I've posted above, just with a skinned station
. I'm going to check over my CFG file to see If I may have enabled something I shouldn't have.Edit: CFG File looks OK, tried a stock CFG and same issue. I downloaded Ittiz version and ran it stock. While the intro was completely screwy, the station model was correct. I then applied your+nanite zips to it, station model looks as shown in my screenshots above again. Very strange!
Last edited:
I'm a little confused by this tbh!
I've just retested a clean ittiz beta3 and also ffed3d_complete, and haven't seen the same problem.
the stock game & ittiz's executable aren't remapping the intro station to the replacement models, so in some scenes of the intro either draw a completely 'original' FFE primitives-based station model, or later an original central section with replacement 'arms'.
I added the remapping in v1.03 and haven't had this reported before - perhaps no-one watches the intro that far!! One thing I had to do for the intro was to specifically rotate the body of the station for the replacement model so that it doesn't appear in the orientation that you've seen it in... but you are now seeing the replacement central section and it's still sideways on? :S
Could you check in game if these stations are ok?
You can do so with the system chart, select Tau Ceti that's in the top right corner of (0,0). If you then switch to the target system planetary view (the far right cockpit icon) and select and zoom in on Taylor Colony, you'll then be able to select and zoom in on Gilmour Orbiter, a 4-armed station. Does this one draw ok?
Vega (-3,2) has a 2 armed variant, Fort Dixon which orbits Tracy's Haven.
Sounds like the rotation isn't being applied in the intro sequence, which is rather odd...
I've just retested a clean ittiz beta3 and also ffed3d_complete, and haven't seen the same problem.
the stock game & ittiz's executable aren't remapping the intro station to the replacement models, so in some scenes of the intro either draw a completely 'original' FFE primitives-based station model, or later an original central section with replacement 'arms'.
I added the remapping in v1.03 and haven't had this reported before - perhaps no-one watches the intro that far!! One thing I had to do for the intro was to specifically rotate the body of the station for the replacement model so that it doesn't appear in the orientation that you've seen it in... but you are now seeing the replacement central section and it's still sideways on? :S
Could you check in game if these stations are ok?
You can do so with the system chart, select Tau Ceti that's in the top right corner of (0,0). If you then switch to the target system planetary view (the far right cockpit icon) and select and zoom in on Taylor Colony, you'll then be able to select and zoom in on Gilmour Orbiter, a 4-armed station. Does this one draw ok?
Vega (-3,2) has a 2 armed variant, Fort Dixon which orbits Tracy's Haven.
Sounds like the rotation isn't being applied in the intro sequence, which is rather odd...
Last edited:
The station model there renders properly, but the center station texture still doesn't match the arms. However the docking port shows up in this one
http://i.imgur.com/gIKQTj3.png
http://i.imgur.com/UXRT83G.jpg
Did you want me to zip up my entire installation and stick it on dropbox? Would that make anything easier for you to diagnose perhaps?
http://i.imgur.com/gIKQTj3.png
http://i.imgur.com/UXRT83G.jpg
Did you want me to zip up my entire installation and stick it on dropbox? Would that make anything easier for you to diagnose perhaps?
Awesome, thank you. I'm grabbing it now, sorry for the headache!
I think that it's I that should be saying sorry!
I think that it's I that should be saying sorry!
Honestly Andy, you have nothing to apologise for. Your work on FFED3D has been amazing
So, I recorded the intro to FFED3D with AndyJ and nanite2000's excellent work, kind of to showcase how things are looking in the game thus far. I've stuck it on YouTube.
I've also taken all of the screenshots that nanite2000 provided in his texture packages and added them into an imgur album.
One last thing, I have a reddit thread going, in the /r/elitedangerous and /r/spacesimgames subreddits. This is where most of the interest seems to come from so far, obviously because of ED.
The Imgur album already has over 1,000 views though, and I only put it up yesterday. At any rate, hopefully all the hard work you guys put into FFE will be noticed by more people looking for that nostalgic fix from the past.
I've also taken all of the screenshots that nanite2000 provided in his texture packages and added them into an imgur album.
One last thing, I have a reddit thread going, in the /r/elitedangerous and /r/spacesimgames subreddits. This is where most of the interest seems to come from so far, obviously because of ED.
The Imgur album already has over 1,000 views though, and I only put it up yesterday. At any rate, hopefully all the hard work you guys put into FFE will be noticed by more people looking for that nostalgic fix from the past.
Honestly Andy, you have nothing to apologise for. Your work on FFED3D has been amazing
+1 from me too
Great work from Andy that is most appreciated. Ohh and nanite2000 too
Last edited:
Looks awesome. It's fantastic to see this version released - it's been a long journey!
Sweet! Ummm...except I should have mentioned that I already have an Imgur album setup for this texture pack, as well as my others:
http://nanite2000.imgur.com/
But more publicity is good publicity!