By the way tacofangs, have you ever considered linking to some of your explanations of the dev perspective the Topics That Will Not Die (viewscreens, ship interiors, and so on) in your signature?
...talking to players is like being a mall Santa. Everyone immediately wants to tell you all of the things they want, and you are absolutely powerless to deliver 99% of them.
By the way tacofangs, have you ever considered linking to some of your explanations of the dev perspective the Topics That Will Not Die (viewscreens, ship interiors, and so on) in your signature?
We really need a sticky post with a compilation of those explanations.
By the way tacofangs, have you ever considered linking to some of your explanations of the dev perspective the Topics That Will Not Die (viewscreens, ship interiors, and so on) in your signature?
I'm surprised nobody's thought of that title for a thread before now!
I'd do it, but I'm on my way to work in a little while.
STO Member since February 2009. I Was A Trekkie Before It Was Cool ... Sept. 8th, 1966 ... Not To Mention Before Most Folks Around Here Were Born! Forever a STO Veteran-Minion
STO playable like Bridge Commander is my idea of a perfect interface... I actually wish wandering around the ship on more fleshed out maps with more interactive crew was the main core of the game and playing it external chase view was the option.
I agree with this statement and keep playing the game while waiting for the day that something like this happens
No, actually, we can't currently. While that is likely the best approach, we currently do not have any tech to do such a thing, and it would require a pretty significant undertaking by the graphics team to make it happen. Remember, while one game might have X, and another game might have Y, they don't both have X and Y.
You seem to be failing to understand that textures are 2 dimensional. Not all viewscreens are using the same texture at the moment, but let's pretend they are. We could hypothetically replace that texture with a new one, but that doesn't do jack to get you a holographic, 3d looking viewscreen. That's taking a newspaper page and replacing it with a magazine page.
Creating a 3d viewscreen would require one of two approaches. 1) Cut a hole in the geo, and make sure you can only see whatever we want you to through said hole. 2) Create Portal tech, and use that to project a camera onto a 2 dimensional surface. Neither of those are strictly texture changes.
This is most certainly untrue.
There is currently NO concept of a 'camera' in our engine, other than the one YOU are looking through all the time.
In a number of cases, I have put 'more interesting' things on the viewscreen of the bridges I've made. In all cases, we get complaints. i.e. "Why am I always looking at P'Jem'?
And apparently no one has actually bothered to look at their Scimitar bridge after the first day, because I fixed that viewscreen almost immediately. (Now looking at New Romulus, which I'm sure will also garner complaints)
While cool, this too would be difficult. Not only would we need a way to determine what map you came to your bridge from and pass that along, but we'd also need to create a texture representing every solar system/sector in the game, and would then have to duplicate each viewscreen, on each map, by that many new textures, and create a system that swaps between them depending on that initial variable. Again, not a trivial task.
One thing you could conceivably do easier (not saying "no work", just "easier") is to build a soundstage on every bridge map.
For a bridge viewscreen action (maybe only usable while in the Captain's chair), the camera avatar transitions in on the viewscreen. Fade to black. Camera reappears on the soundstage with a UI "viewscreen" border to make it look like you're seeing something on a viewscreen.
...Not only would we need a way to determine what map you came to your bridge from and pass that along...
I accept that I'm likely wrong in every way but isn't this already in the game...? Since bridge instances tend to disappear, if you log off on your bridge and it times out, you're deposited on your last known permanent map, so somehow the game knows where you were last...
Not that it helps considering all the other work needed anyway, but still...
I accept that I'm likely wrong in every way but isn't this already in the game...? Since bridge instances tend to disappear, if you log off on your bridge and it times out, you're deposited on your last known permanent map, so somehow the game knows where you were last...
Not that it helps considering all the other work needed anyway, but still...
The parameter is obviously there, but there is no way for me to hook geometry up to that. It's some magic behind the scenes thing that just keeps track of your character. Nothing tying that to stuff on a map exists.
I dont care if the main viewer shows where I am currently....
but... it would be cool if you made it like a trophy selection slot:
by unlocking various screens to choose from on your bridge.
anything but the plain-ole starry scene that we have now.
.
Seconded. The trophy tech is obviously there, really not much retrofitting (for the standard bridges, not sure about the special custom made ones as I've rarely been on them), still uses the same 2D textures such as Tacos New Rommie one and maybe 1 new one of an animated warp field...much less hassle much more visual gain...as long as we dont have to pay dill to unlock them :P 2nd best to holo view-screens
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Comments
We really need a sticky post with a compilation of those explanations.
I'm surprised nobody's thought of that title for a thread before now!
I'd do it, but I'm on my way to work in a little while.
I Was A Trekkie Before It Was Cool ... Sept. 8th, 1966 ... Not To Mention Before Most Folks Around Here Were Born!
Forever a STO Veteran-Minion
I believe that there was none in the show on those ships either
I agree with this statement and keep playing the game while waiting for the day that something like this happens
One thing you could conceivably do easier (not saying "no work", just "easier") is to build a soundstage on every bridge map.
For a bridge viewscreen action (maybe only usable while in the Captain's chair), the camera avatar transitions in on the viewscreen. Fade to black. Camera reappears on the soundstage with a UI "viewscreen" border to make it look like you're seeing something on a viewscreen.
I accept that I'm likely wrong in every way but isn't this already in the game...? Since bridge instances tend to disappear, if you log off on your bridge and it times out, you're deposited on your last known permanent map, so somehow the game knows where you were last...
Not that it helps considering all the other work needed anyway, but still...
but... it would be cool if you made it like a trophy selection slot:
by unlocking various screens to choose from on your bridge.
anything but the plain-ole starry scene that we have now.
.
---- FIRE EVERYTHING ! ----
The parameter is obviously there, but there is no way for me to hook geometry up to that. It's some magic behind the scenes thing that just keeps track of your character. Nothing tying that to stuff on a map exists.
Seconded. The trophy tech is obviously there, really not much retrofitting (for the standard bridges, not sure about the special custom made ones as I've rarely been on them), still uses the same 2D textures such as Tacos New Rommie one and maybe 1 new one of an animated warp field...much less hassle much more visual gain...as long as we dont have to pay dill to unlock them :P 2nd best to holo view-screens
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