August 7th, 2004Two Weeks Until DPCon!That's right, so sign up! Also, for people who were wondering about hotel pricing, I think we have a deal worked out for $60/night. That means just $30 if you room with somebody.
I'm working on a design right now for the shirts, and here's what I have so far:
These are going to be quality screen printed shirts, not some cheap white t-shirts run through the printer. :) We'll also have Atlantis Gaming Center shirts that you might be able to win.
So here's a run down of why you should go to DPCon: - Meet lots of cool people you've been playing the mod with online. - Tournaments with cool prizes (Trophies, T-Shirts, GeforceFX, E3 swag, etc) - Crazy gameplay you won't be able to do outside of a LAN - Live DJ - Premier of new game modes and maps - Real paintball - It's just gonna rock! Build 11 Progress UpdateSorry this is taking so long, but like I mentioned earlier, there's a lot of things that have to be completely done or it won't work at all. One of the nice things about this new build is that combined with the new 1.80 server version, the client will have all the necessary information to interpret things client-side so you can have the client generate event messages and scoreboards meaning less lag and faster response. It will even allow you to pull the scoreboard up at any time while you watch demos. Here's a couple screenshots:
Of course, when things are rendered client-side, you can do fancy things with them, such as draw item pickups in the lower-left corner and when you get killed, pop a message up on the center of the screen saying who killed you. Eventually I'd like to make all that customizable so you can select what happens on certain events - maybe play different sounds, flash icons, etc.
If you're wondering about the new bar below the old CO2 bar - that's something I'm experimenting with to reduce nonstop spray: gun temperature. Each time you fire, the bar increases. When it maxes out, the gun freezes briefly. Of course the bar will always drop slowly, so as long as you don't spray for long periods of time, it won't freeze on you. It's mainly to prevent people from running around the whole map firing nonstop.
Also note the names on the screenshots - well, the first one is just messing around with font colors, but the second shows a nice server-side feature that prevents people from having the same name. If a "bob" is playing, and another "bob" connects, the second will get the name "bob(1)." If a third connects, he'll get "bob(2)," etc.
Release is planned for this week - then we'll work on the special additions for DPCon. ;) July 28th, 2004DPCon2 UpateOk, we have a set date now. DPCon will be held on August 21st and 22nd. Sign-in and setup starts at 2:00PM. That's pretty soon, so hurry up and sign up if you want to go. We also have the DPCon 2.0 Summary Page up. Check that for all the pertinent information.
It also looks like we have a GeForce FX donated for one of the prizes. FourthX is planning to bring his DJ equipment, so we'll have some pretty kickin' music going on as well. Be sure to check out #ApexGameServers on IRC.EnterTheGame.Com -- our sponsors for this cool stuff. July 25th, 2004DPCon 2.0!It's back and better than ever! Do you want to meet the developers of Paintball2 as well as a bunch of people you've played with online? Here's your chance: Digital Paint Conference 2.0 - a LAN party for Paintball2 and then some!
We'll be doing all kinds of cool stuff - tournaments, pickup games, real life paintball, and possibly some clan matches, plus there will be some exclusive sneak peeks at new maps and game modes.
You'll get to show everyone what you're really made of -- no lag, no cheaters, no lamers, none of that stuff that plagues online play. Also, you'll have a chance to get revenge on all those chair commandos when we go out to play real paintball.
Here's how it works. If you're interested, sign up and pick a date in August that's good for you. We'll probably start it on the 21st unless it conflicts with too many people's schedules. If you need a ride or a roommate, check out the transportation and rooming threads.
Bringing your own computer is optional, however it's a good idea to do so in order to make sure we have enough equipment for everyone. Check out the DPCon 2.0 thread for more details. I'll have a page set up soon with directions and other specifics. Be sure to spread the news and check back for updates! June 7th, 2004DPL Returns!The Digital Paintball League is returning under completely new management for what we hope will be a great summer season. We are signing up a total of 8 clans for a 6-week regular season, followed by a short playoff season. If your clan can field at least 4 members per match, and you are serious about playing every week for 6 weeks, head on over to the DPL site, read the rules and then sign up your team. Only serious clans need apply. May 30th, 2004What's in the Works - Client Messages and CausticsThere probably won't be a whole lot that will change in the way of eye candy for the next client release. For the most part I've been working on server side updates (as mentioned in the previous post) and tweaking the way the client and server talk to each other in order to reduce bandwidth.
One of the nice things about the way I'm handling messages is that it gives me control on the client side as to what I do with the information. For example, the first screenshot below shows item pickups and drops. Instead of displaying "You picked up a Trracer." or "You dropped your Automag." it scrolls the item names up on the bottom of the screen then fades them out -- no more cluttering the console (though the smart people probably have "msg" set to 1 so they don't see item pickups anyway). It conveniently uses about 1/20th of the bandwidth the old messages did, too.
I'm planning to do a lot with this. For example, I could have the team chat messages and regular chat messages in different locations, or be different colors. I could possibly display abbreviated elimination messages like Half-Life does, etc. I'd like to have a separate chat window which shows only the chat messages (so you don’t have to scroll through the mess in the console). Another big thing will be the client side scoreboard. It won't have to be cut off when there are a lot of people playing due to bandwidth restrictions and overflow problems. Once I get everything implemented it will be easy to change, and I'll probably have some client side settings. Getting everything implemented and working properly is taking a wile, though, so have patience.
Of course I will be throwing in some eye candy, too. I used this cool caustics generator to make some realistic animated caustics textures and combined them with some RScript effects to yield some very nice results. I still have some bugs to work out, though. Eventually I'll be making some awesome pixel shader effects for the water surface as well.
E3As some of you know, Calrathan and I went to E3 this year. It was pretty cool, but not quite what we were hoping for. We were looking forward to talking to a bunch of game developers and such, but it ended up being more like a giant, electronic Disneyland. I've started my report on my websitehere. Calrathan doesn't have internet at his summer place yet, so you'll have to wait to see his view of it.