A Question of Graphics

[Pumpkinhead]

I've created some small animations from the SMOKE.PCK file, but I'm not sure what each is used for exactly. I can't check for myself as my game runs too fast to really tell. Can someone please confirm each of these?:

 

Fire

Ground Fire:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/fire_ground.gif

Unit Fire:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/fire_unit.gif

 

Smoke

Light:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/smoke1.gif

Normal:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/smoke2.gif

Heavy:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/smoke3.gif

 

Weapon Hits

Bullet:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/bullet.gif

Laser:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/laser.gif

Plasma:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/plasma.gif

Melee:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/melee.gif

 

Does anyone know where the Blaster Bomb explosion is stored? I can't seem to find it

[Hobbes]

I think the Bullet hit is the Laser one (and vice-versa).

[BreakMage]

I agree with Hobbes. Also, I wish mine ran slow enough that I could actually see those animations.

[Hobbes]

Can't you do that by using the game speed controls?

[BreakMage]

Not even with a 1.4gHz processor and XCOMUTIL's loader. :/

[Blehm 98]

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/melee.gif is also psi attacks i think

[Pumpkinhead]

Can't you do that by using the game speed controls?

Unfortunately, no. I have a 1.7GHz, and run the game at the very lowest speed possible, and everything still moves too fast for me to see. I can't even scroll properly.

[Pumpkinhead]

So it should be this then?:

 

Weapon Hits

Bullet:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/laser.gif

Laser:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/bullet.gif

Melee/Psi-Attack:

https://ufopaedia.xcomufo.com/pics/melee.gif

 

Can anyone else confirm this?

[Hobbes]

I think blehm is right about the psi attack graphic

[Gray Fox]

They seem right. I run ufo on a 2.8 gHz and have no problems seeing the weapon hits if I select the slowest fire speed option.

[Bomb Bloke]

The explosion animation is a lot bigger then the smaller, single square ones you have there. Perhaps it's made up of smaller animations grouped together. That's what I'd expect.

[Pumpkinhead]

Has anyone else noticed that there's a face in the smoke?

 

Is it a Sectoid, or a human skull?

 

There's a skull in the explosion animations too, isn't there?

[Jman4117]

Yep. All the frames in rapid sucession make it look like a skull.

[Zombie]

By the looks of things, the face in the smoke closely resembles the Sectoid.

 

Actually, explosions are composed of many "skulls" interlaced together. When a skull grows to its maximum size, another skull rises up from the depths and becomes larger and larger until it too hits the maximum size. The number of skulls that materialize seems to be related to explosive strength. The higher the damage, the more skulls appear.

 

Pumpkinhead: you have two fires listed - the ground fire and the unit fire. I am assuming that a ground fire is a fire that burns on a horizontal surface and the unit fire is what an alien, soldier or civilian looks like when they catch fire, right?

 

I think that the ground fire has varying degrees like smoke does. A small fire is created with the AC-I ammo, a medium fire with the HC-I ammo, and a large scale fire from an incendiary rocket. Or keep blasting away at a certain spot with incendiary ammo from an Auto or Heavy Cannon, and eventually it will become the large fire! Do you have these fires also, or were you only able to pilfer one from the game?

[JellyfishGreen]

Pumpkinhead, the explosion for the BB is in X1.pck. I could sort of see it with WinPCK but not PCKView (program crashed on me). This explosion animation is repeated on several overlapping tiles, as already noted.

[Pumpkinhead]

Pumpkinhead: you have two fires listed - the ground fire and the unit fire. I am assuming that a ground fire is a fire that burns on a horizontal surface and the unit fire is what an alien, soldier or civilian looks like when they catch fire, right?

Precisely. The unit fire is the fire that overlaps the unit when they catch alight.

 

I think that the ground fire has varying degrees like smoke does. A small fire is created with the AC-I ammo, a medium fire with the HC-I ammo, and a large scale fire from an incendiary rocket. Or keep blasting away at a certain spot with incendiary ammo from an Auto or Heavy Cannon, and eventually it will become the large fire! Do you have these fires also, or were you only able to pilfer one from the game? 

There's only one fire animation in the SMOKE.PCK file. I didn't realise that there were varying degrees

[Pumpkinhead]

Pumpkinhead, the explosion for the BB is in X1.pck. I could sort of see it with WinPCK but not PCKView (program crashed on me).

Unfortunately, I can't open X1.PCK with any of the programs I have

[Zombie]

(Pumpkinhead @ Jul 8 2004, 07:56 AM)

There's only one fire animation in the SMOKE.PCK file. I didn't realise that there were varying degrees.

 

Try this out (when your game is not crashing on you): blast away with incendiary ammunition of various strengths. Now, observe the intensity and compare and contrast against the small fire created by AC-I ammo. Evaluate it on different landscapes also. There really is varying degrees of incendiary strength!

 

Strange that the SMOKE.PCK file only has one animation though. Maybe the other animations are stored elsewhere?

 

----------

 

And to confirm/support your weapon hits table:

Bullets/AP ammo is the blue one,

Laser fire is the orange one,

Plasma fire is the green one, and

Melee/Psi Attacks is the orange star.

 

Mmmm.... fireworks. Pretty!

[Pumpkinhead]

Mmmm.... fireworks. Pretty! 

They do look like fireworks, don't they!

[Pumpkinhead]

Thanks to Daishiva's latest PCKView update, I now have the X1.PCK explosion animation:

 

Explosion

 

https://members.dodo.com.au/~shoobs/pics/explosion.gif

[Jman4117]

So it really is a skull..... O.o

[Maugan Ra]

I found out last time i played it on my amiga..

very low on MHz...

[Pumpkinhead]

Is that animation used for all explosions, or just the HE?

 

If my memory serves my correctly, the BB creates 3 lots or something

[FullAuto]

AFAIK that animation is for all explosions, HE, incendiary, stun bombs etc. The size of the explosion does vary depending on what the weapon is.

[Zombie]

All explosions, no matter what the type, have the same animation. Grenades (which include the normal grenade, Proximity grenade, alien grenade, and the High Explosive) have this graphic as does explosive ammunition (Auto Cannon-HE shells, Heavy Cannon-HE shells, Small Rocket, Large Rocket and the Blaster Bomb). The incendiary explosions (Auto Cannon-I shells, Heavy Cannon-I shells and the Incendiary Rocket) as well as the Stun Bomb also share the same graphic.

 

The only difference in the animation depends on the strength of the weapon. For example, an Auto Cannon-HE detonation is smaller than the Heavy Cannon-HE. How many skulls that appear seems to be related to the magnitude of the blast. If the explosion affects a greater area, more skulls are included. Thus, a large explosion animation takes longer to finish than does a smaller, more localized discharge.

 

When you see an explosion graphic in the computer version, it usually finishes so fast that it is hard to tell how long it lasted. (Unless you use a program to slow down the processor somewhat). The Playstation version of X-COM is naturally slower than the computer version so explosions run in their full unmodified glory. It is really fun to watch a Blaster Bomb explosion in the PSX version, it seems to last forever!