New FXs.

[pip]

At the end of the day an FX update will always be a good thing for the game, I have some free time at the moment and I'll see if I have the skills to tone some down.

I think an FX update IS needed, but maybe not THIS one.

What are people's opinion on an FXbupdate in general? Personally I believe it's a great idea, the FX are slightly old, and new FX gives a REALLY good impression of the game being worked on and improved. (On the PA forums people still talk about it as simply a balance MOD -_-)

I tried to look into it, the system is very clever, with randomization of fx and sizes, but it's quite complicated to figure out what values to change to tune down the fx. Here are things you can try to do :

1) tone down the explosions a lot and keep them (especially the particle / debris, that would be best).
2) remove the second explosion that occurs when the death animation of the bots ends, that would be much better (or tune it down so that it's just a small flash and not a second super big explosion).
3) if you can't, just remove all explosions and keep only the improved fx for the weapons would be already a great improvement over the stock fx
4) no matter what, the fire animation for the trees needs to be removed. Not only is the fire much less realistic thant the default animation, but also when the ACU spawn, the trees are not blown off properly.

I hope you can achieve this at least partlmy, or someone else, otherwise, it's sadly better to remove everything.

[Hamstie]

I like the new fx of unit explosions. The only thing that slightly bothers me is the range of the inital blast. Imo a big blast is because its something important/expensive like an ACU. With the new fxs I sometimes think 'wow, what was that explosion? Must be something important because of the huge blast.' So I look and come to the conclusion its just a random t1 unit :S . I propose to reduce the inital blast radius with 25-50%. This would also solve the problem of some people not being able to see the battles because of the explosions.

[pip]

I tested a bit. An easy way to keep the nice new weapon fx and get rid of the too flashy explosions (until someone is able to tone them down) is to restore the unit.lua and defaultexplosion.lua and erase the "explosion effects" section of the effecttemplates.lua

Code: Select all

#---------------------------------------------------------------
# Explosion Effects
#---------------------------------------------------------------
ExplosionEffectsSml01 = TableCat( FlareSml01, ExplosionDebrisSml01, TLandGaussCannonHit01 )
ExplosionEffectsMed01 = TableCat( SmokeMed01, FlareSml01, ExplosionDebrisMed01, ExplosionDebrisSml01, NapalmExplosion )
ExplosionEffectsLrg01 = TableCat( FlareSml01, SmokeLrg01, ExplosionDebrisLrg01, NapalmExplosion, TLandGaussCannonHit01 )
ExplosionEffectsDefault01 = ExplosionEffectsMed01
ExplosionEffectsSml02 = TableCat( FlareSml01, ExplosionDebrisSml01, NapalmExplosion, TLandGaussCannonHit01 )
ExplosionEffectsMed02 = TableCat( SmokeMed01, FlareSml01, ExplosionDebrisMed01, ExplosionDebrisSml01, TLandGaussCannonHit01 )
ExplosionEffectsLrg02 = TableCat( FlareSml01, SmokeLrg01, ExplosionDebrisLrg01, BigExplosion, NapalmExplosion, TLandGaussCannonHit01 )

DefaultHitExplosion01 = TableCat( FlashSml01, FlareSml01, TLandGaussCannonHit01, SmokeMed01  )
DefaultHitExplosion02 = TableCat( FlashSml01, FlareSml01, SmokeSml01 )

ExplosionEffectsAir = TableCat( FlashSml01, FlareSml01, FireCloudExplosion  )
DefaultHitExplosionAir = TableCat( FlashSml01, FlareSml01, FireCloudExplosion  )

I would also personnally remove the "reclaim effects", the flash is too big, there is no need to increase this effect.

#---------------------------------------------------------------
# Reclaim Effects
#---------------------------------------------------------------
ReclaimBeams = {
EmtBpPath .. 'reclaim_beam_01_emit.bp',
EmtBpPath .. 'reclaim_beam_02_emit.bp',
EmtBpPath .. 'reclaim_beam_03_emit.bp',
}

ReclaimObjectAOE = { '/effects/emitters/reclaim_01_emit.bp' }
ReclaimObjectEnd = { '/effects/emitters/reclaim_02_emit.bp' }

After that, a big problem remains : the ugly fire fx for trees that also doesn't destroy trees enough when the ACU spaws. I can't find what needs to be changed / reverted to get the normal fire back.

EDIT: since this thread is about testing new fx, I'm posting here a new fx for the cerberus / rhino shot.

EDIT2: if the poptree.lua is modified too, it should be restored to prevent the (ugly) fire to not destroy trees enough when ACU spawns.

[Lu_Xun_17]

I'm pretty sure a modder made a visual effects redesign mod few years ago. I will try to find back the topic on gpgnet forum.

Those new effects are not bad, but not extraordinary either.

[Raghar]

I'm not particularly fond of them (even I would like more particles effects when things explode), but some people want them in, so I give it a try.

They are unambiguously bad. Can you give us names of these people? Just to know they have no taste.

[eXcalibur]

there is another fx mod, which is called "Firey_Explosion_Mod" maybe you can look into this and take something (if it is possible).

look here: http://www.moddb.com/mods/firey-explosi ... ion-mod-23

[Krapougnak]

Also this one :

http://www.moddb.com/mods/supreme-battlefeel

[Ato0theJ]

Also this one :

http://www.moddb.com/mods/supreme-battlefeel

I can vouch for this one, I don't remember any issues, but it was so awesome.

[Ze_PilOt]

Also this one :

http://www.moddb.com/mods/supreme-battlefeel

I can vouch for this one, I don't remember any issues, but it was so awesome.

We are taking of a 100 mb mod here.

Also, need mod author authorization.

[eXcalibur]

Also this one :

http://www.moddb.com/mods/supreme-battlefeel

this is just the Firey_Explosion_Mod i linked with some (500mb) of extra textures...

i have not taken a look at them, but i will do this ASAP. it looks like you have to replace your textures. therefore, you can use the textures without the other players in your game having to use them, too...