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BentonGrey

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  1. Thanks Blunter, that was extremely informative! I think it may be worth while updating to H&S after-all. The sawed off rifles will serve as nice models for a shotgun, even if I have to make them fire slugs and not shot. It doesn't seem like it's lost to much. I'm not sure about all the rebalancing though, but since I haven't really played H&S, I can't really say. How easy is it to modify that stuff, though? At the very least I'd want to restore the vanilla hitpoint gains, as I like a more durable merc. I am dealing with action heroes, after all. It seems that I can find H&S for only around ten bucks...I think that's do-able. Ohh, I've heard mention of tanks. I assume they've been implemented using the code that was behind the PKs? How many different kinds of tanks are there? It would be pretty great if I could add the JOE vehicles as well as the JOEs themselves.
  2. Thanks for the well-wishes Daredevil! Wow Blunter, thanks for that detailed and thorough response! There is some great information there. I really appreciate you taking the time to write all of that up for me. As far as the G.I. JOE theme goes, well, I'm a child of the 80's, so of course I was all about Ninja Turtles, Transformers, and G.I. JOE when I was a kid. I picked up the original Marvel comic run of the JOEs a couple years back and was amazed at just how good it was. The stories are written by a Vietnam vet who knows the kind of world and characters he is creating. It was a great book, filled with social commentary, compelling stories, interesting characters, and more adventure than you could shake a stick at. The cartoon was like the comics inbred idiot cousin. Anyway, back to your kind response: I do have a few questions for you, if you don't mind. First, I follow most of you instructions regarding textures, but you say: "To make the texture modification process easier, copy the screen (Shift+print screen on my machine) with the texture you are interested in working with on the screen and paste it in your paint shop app. It already has the size and format you need, just crop it out of the image and it's ready to be altered in whatever way you wish..." I've seen this referenced before around the boards, but where in the editor can I view the texture itself? I can find it applied to a model easily enough, but how do I view the actual 2D texture? Second, and perhaps most important, you say that the H&S editor is better, hmm? I have been debating whether or not to pick H&S up. After all, it is a slightly more modern setting which means that it would have at least a few pieces of equipment that I wouldn't need to add myself eventually. What makes the editor better? Also, do you have a larger pool of characters to draw from than in S2? You say that some desert and winter textures aren't available with it? Are there still some desert and winter textures included? There are several story arcs that take place in frozen or desert locations, although they are by far in the minority compared with urban or jungle locations. I suppose as long as there are some it will be okay. You've made me think even more about moving the project to H&S, and I'd just like to have a good idea about what I'm getting into. Lastly, what is the best way to add/modify the mercs that make up the pool you draw your team from? I want to have a set of characters with the names and bios of the JOEs, but modifying the Pers entries in the S2 editor seems to have given me some pretty bad bugs. Should I just create new characters? If so, how do I ensure that they show up in preference to the built-ins? Also, I have begun to get a pretty good idea of what would be involved to mod this game, and I'm no stranger to hard work and long projects. I've spent the last three years working on a MASSIVE mod of the DC Universe for a game called Freedom Force. You're not going to scare me off. : I should have an updated release of that project done by the end of the summer or so, and I'm looking for the next project. The easiest thing would be to create a Transformers campaign for Freedom Force, but I am a bit hard headed, and I've wanted to do a G.I. JOE mod for years and years. Thank you for your help Blunter!
  3. Alright, here is an update and an open letter to whoever might still be around who has some experience with modding: I have finished the JOEs as far as I am able at the moment. All of the built in mercs' strings info has been modified to match the the JOE characters that are replacing them. I have also modified them visually, using the built in art assets as well as I can manage to approximate their looks. For some of them this is relatively successful, for others it is decidedly unsuccessful. To spitball it, I'd say that 85% of the JOEs could get by with minor to major skin modifications, but some (like Spirit, Hawk, and a few others) could really use some new meshes. I could do a very little bit with the skins myself (I could probably turn the Terror uniform blue for a Cobra Trooper), but I have hit a snag with the mmp2tga converter. It is as follows: It is not working for me after all. If I enter the texture name 2542.mmp, then the command line tells me it is unable to open the file. If I rename the file into an mmp (as all the numbered files generated by the resextractor are just "file" designated), or if I just call the number itself without the .mmp suffix, the command line gets stuck in an endless loop telling me it is truncated. I've tried it with a dozen different textures, no luck on any of them. Did the resextractor spit out the right kinds of files? Am I doing something wrong here? On the main mod front I am beginning to get some idea of how the map and scenario editing works, and I think I could probably put together at least a basic campaign given the time. However, I am completely and totally stuck at the moment. I have a game breaking bug that I can't seem to chase down. I am assuming that it involves my editing of the built-in Allied characters, since this hard freeze occurs just at the point where I should be able to examine their dossiers. I have modified their appearance as I stated, and their string entries, along with some of their stats. I assumed originally that this error was caused by the fact that I modified the characters' names as they appeared in the tree on the left, but I returned each of these to the original name, and I am still getting the error. I really need help on this most profoundly. If anyone cares to share their wisdom regarding the creation of a campaign, please feel free. I need all the help I can get.
  4. Thanks Slaughter, you've been a big help! I will definitely contact some of the absent modders. With any luck one or two of them will still be checking their PMs, and they can help me along a bit.
  5. Okay, I've had time to test this now, and it is not working for me after all. If I enter the texture name 2542.mmp, then the command line tells me it is unable to open the file. If I rename the file into an mmp (as all the numbered files generated by the resextractor are just "file" designated), or if I just call the number itself without the .mmp suffix, the command line gets stuck in an endless loop telling me it is truncated. I've tried it with a dozen different textures, no luck on any of them. Did the resextractor spit out the right kinds of files? Am I doing something wrong here? :EDIT: I've also got another question, and I'm hoping that you might be able to help me, Slaughter. You seem to know where a lot of info is around here. Have you come across any tutorials about modding the actual campaign of the game? It seems to me that the easiest way to create my own campaign would be to simply alter the vanilla maps and their mixes of enemies and scripts. I've just started poking around with this, but the campaign structure is much less intuitive than other games I've worked on. I've searched these forums, and I've found some information about creating custom maps, but none about actually creating campaigns. Any info you could point me to would be quite helpful. :EDIT: And a third question, is there any way to modify the portraits of your mercs? I'd like to replace them with scans of the JOEs from the comics.
  6. Thanks again for replying Slaughter, and I had not seen that info. I will test it tomorrow.
  7. Okay, I'm just an idiot. Thanks for the reply Slaughter, I've got it working now. However, I can't seem to figure out the mmp/tga converter.
  8. Okay, hopefully someone is around who can help me out here. I have been trying to get these textures extracted for a while now, but I have had no luck. I've followed the instructions in this thread to the best of my ability, but I still don't seem to have any textures to show for it. I've tried both dragging and dropping as described, and I've tried using the command line method. The former does something, listing off file names in a command window, but when it closes, there are no textures in the res directory, or anywhere else I can find. The command line didn't seem to do much. It gave me some info about the res extractor, then said Usage: reXtract Resfilename [wildcard]. Can anyone give me a hand?
  9. Awesome! Thanks for taking the effort to contact those guys. There isn't any hurry, it will be a while before I have anything to show, anyway.
  10. Thanks for the response and encouragement Zombie. You know, you might be able to help me just by being another set of eyes, if you are interested. When I get the JOEs and Cobras set up, I'll take some screen shots, and maybe link to pictures of the characters themselves. If you want, you could help me determine if there are any pieces that might work better than what I'm using. It'll be a while 'till I get there though. Any luck with the emails?
  11. I have no clue if anyone is actually reading these forums, but on the off chance that someone is (other than Zombie, and I hope you see this too ), here is a quick update. I've been working on this a bit in the last few days, although I didn't think I was going to get to it for a few months. I suppose the idea just sorta' grabbed me. Anyway, I haven't made tons of progress, but I do have the JOEs about a 1/3 of the way done...well, in what I CAN do for them. That is, I am chosing models and heads that come as close as I can to the characters, since I don't have any real artistic skills. I am going to experiment with some simple color changes in Photoshop later on though. I'm getting ready to try and make some Cobra troopers, since all that should require is changing the renegade soldiers from gray to blue, which I might be able to handle. I'm also doing all the text editing necessary, changing names, bios, the rest. Once that's finished, I will have to actually edit stats, which will probably take the longest of any of these things. After that, I'm going to throw together a test mission (something along the lines of GI JOE issue #1) to see how everything handles. Then, it's on to the Cobras. If by some miracle I actually manage to finish this, I'd like to have campaigns for both the JOEs AND the Cobras. :EDIT: Ohh, and I've got a quick question. Does anyone (if anybody is out there) know if there is a way to change a character's skin color in the editor.
  12. Thanks for the response Zombie. I have started messing around with the editor a bit, trying to get my sealegs as it were. I won't be able to really start on this until late summer most likely, but I think I will try and do a little in the meantime. Feel free to send out some emails! There is quite a lot that I can do, just in terms of setting up missions, renaming and rebalancing characters, but they will never visually be the JOEs or Cobra without some help. Yeah, there are a LOT of weapons, which is why my initial thought was that Hired Guns: The Jagged Edge would be a much better game for the mod, but it lacks a map editor. I'm also hopeful that Jagged Alliance 3 will actually be released one day, but until then, Silent Storm is the best fit. It really does have tons of potential, and given enough support even the PK's could be turned into something useful. Steeler could, in theory, drive his tank, and Clutch could drive his Vamp, based on the PK, but that is definitely beyond little old me.0
  13. So, some time ago I posted on the old boards about a GI JOE mod I was undertaking. As it tends to do, life got in the way, and nothing came of the attempt, but in the intervening years I have learned a great deal about the work involved in putting together a mod. I am going to make another attempt, and although this community seems to be pretty quiet these days, I am putting out a call for help. I know that there was at least some discussion about modern weapons back then, and I'd like to know if any were ever modeled. If so, where might I find them. Are there any modders around who might be interested in taking on a new project for this game? I would especially need modelers and skinners. I realize that the chances of me finding a team are fairly slim, but I intend to at least try and put together a campaign, one way or the other.
  14. Hey man, always happy to meet a fellow fan! Here's some screenies of our previous project, if anyone is interested. http://www.joereloaded.com/forum/viewtopic...php?p=1499#1499
  15. I have the same problem, maybe you should post in Nival's tech. support forum?
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