.map file relation to EoC geography?

Oops, Sorry about the confusion:

I checked back into my notes and the source of the original mod and got it straight now:

Of course you can use looped sound for the sound sims. Back then I used (among others) the stock countermeasures loop (cm_loop.wav) and a modified ini to demonstrate a 3D "radiation disturbance" sound. In fact a looped sound is the only option because otherwise the game will only play the (not looped) sound once, immediatly after the sim is created.

The "complications" were voice (chatter) related: I had the impression that you can't(using "loop=1 in the .ini file) loop a voice sample (due to speech pauses?). I had no looped sample that had voice in it for use as a chatter loop. At the time I was unsucessfull at trying to mix a sample with voice in it, into a continous background loop. That was however probably due to lack of knowledge and improper equipment to mix with. Thats why I suggested testing a chatter loop (assuming it has voice-like sounds in it) before you decide for the method.

On the multiple ship issue: it is possible to dynamically add an avatar channel via pog (as demonstrated with the X-Wings S-Foils animation in the Star Wars mod).
Perhaps it's possible to add and remove avatar sound channels too?
Or, perhaps even change the node template (for a specific ship) using the "language of nulls"


Iwar2 Multiplayer Fan Site

No, I have not tested chatter in a loop. Good idea. I should be able to just loop some of the standard EoC sounds. It is odd how sensitive the game is to proper format.

My memory testing: EoC with no extra ships preloaded from flux.ini file, 237.5 meg. With 1 terrapin loaded 242 meg. With 10 different copies of the terrapin preloaded, 242.5 meg. With 20 different copies of the terrapin preloaded 243.5 meg

It looks like a new model takes up quite a bit of space. A compressed terrapin is 1.7 meg, and the first one takes 5 meg of memory. After that, each unique sim.ini file seems to chew up a few hundred K. So from this test, I am guessing that textures and models are cached. I don't know if that will hold true if the avatars have modfied sound.

It does mean that you can expect that each new ship model to take 5 meg of storage (or larger). 100 unique ship models would be 500 meg, and far beyond most machines.

-Gtrout

How (by what means) did you take the memory measurements?


Iwar2 Multiplayer Fan Site

I used the task manager. I was a little worried about the accuracy - so here is my procedure. I would start the game. Start a new game. Once my ship was fully powered up (an arbitary choice, but consistant), I would ctrl-alt-del to get the task manager, and I would look at the memory allocated to the process. I did this several times with the same number showing up. This gave me some confidence the measurement was at least repeatable.

Then I edited the flux.ini to add the terrapins to the preload statement. And I followed the same measurement procedure. This technique is only slightly better than guessing, because we don't realy know where the memory is going or why.

There is only one other way I can think of to get this kind of information. The profile debug mode shows time allocated to loading the models and avatars. We might be able to watch how that number increases. But I have no understanding how those numbers are created - so it is just as poor as the memory measurement.



-Gtrout

Found the spooky sound file!
To get a feel for the ghost ship effect, download and player this file. (From Hot4).
www.i-war2.com/epic/files/SpookyMayday.ZIP

Download this screen shots for a visual effect.
www.i-war2.com/epic/images/headlamp_foundher1.jpg

What do you think? Creepy without the sound and only the image? I find them much stronger together. The ship alone is cold and dark, and can be creepy, but it is the sound that signals that you should be scared.

[As a side note, the new StarWars DVD has a little movie on how they came up with the light sabre sound. And it was interesting to note the sound guy working from pre production sketches. Kind of like this little test with a screen shot and an MP3 file. Much faster to put together than a whole working mod. Much easier to get out to people to sample and test as well.]

-Gtrout