Graphic mod -- Work in Progress

[Philippe]

The image quality of the original is better than in the jpeg. I'm going to sit on the German flags for a week before I decide whether or not to make another attempt. But they're a brighter shade of red than the original and it's impossible to confuse a control flag with an hq flag. Not happy with how the 2 D versions turned out so I'll be taking another look.

I've redone the Persian flag and am working on the Hungarian flag. I'm thinking of leaving the Finnish flag as is, but may change my mind when the game shows up (I'm working off the demo).

Are there any flags that need work on that I may have overlooked? I'm especially interested in situations where there's a civil/national flag and a war flag.

[ChrisND]

I love the German flags! Good work!

[John DiFool the 2nd]

Am I the only one here who plays with the Nato icons? Almost all screenies I see here have the default style, which I find distracting.

[Philippe]

I think Nato icons work best in a two-dimensional environment. The 2-D icons here look a bit like Columbia Games wooden blocks, and somehow seem out of place. I keep wanting to tip them over to see if I can start a domino effect...

[Moonslayer]

Don't like the 2D icons, myself. The 3D ones are so much prettier

[Thrawn78]

Impresssing work, Philippe

[Desert Dave]

Originally posted by Philippe:

I think Nato icons work best in a two-dimensional environment. The 2-D icons here look a bit like Columbia Games wooden blocks, and somehow seem out of place. I keep wanting to tip them over to see if I can start a domino effect...

THE most "miraculous" thing about "playing"

With these VERY adeptly done 2D sprites,

You can get many more unit-types

Out of yer mind and -> into the game. :cool:

In my own 39WIP (... grand campaign

game, as work in progress)

I have managed to include

THIRTY-THREE (33)

Separate and distinctly functional

Military units.

From the original 19,

Not counting transports or amphib craft.

Well, some would say - that ain't

Old-school, punch-card cool 'cuz!

It makes too much cloy & clutter.

I say - no way!

An adroit example - WiF-FE

The never-bored! game has MORE

Unit types than even my modest # of 33

And it don't detract nor

Interfere with good old-fashioned

War game play, IMO.

OK, to accomplish this

Requires a certain amount

Of finesse & finagle

With particular game features

And, essentially,

Being WILLING

To change a received-perceived

Gestalt - somewhat.

Sure, you could also do such as that

With the 3D sprites,

BUT... you'd need be precociously clever

At graphic arts,

And from experience,

And finally,

In most cases - being half-satisfied

With mis-matched sprites.

After all,

Aesthetics is, oh, IMHO, a good FIFTY (50) %

Of any acutely accomplished

War-game - board, or computer.

Your sub-conscious rarely "sees"

What yer lookin' at.

THE best 2D sprites thus far

(... and some some body's gotta go

a ways further to do it enny better, IMO)

Have been done by pzgndr

For his outstanding Mod of A3R.

Alright, to my way of thinking,

THE very best aspect of SC2-WaW,

Is... that unprecedented Editor.

(... no TOAW ain't even in the same

league, more like sandlot ball

compared to the Big Show)

Learn how to use that

(... it ain't all that difficult, rather,

as with anything else unfamiliar, it's

a matter of - simply, taking

that FIRST - risking step)

And ipso trismegistus,

ANYONE could certainly open up

Whole unknown worlds - brand new

Chances for... grand adventure. :cool:

[Philippe]

Nato icons are superior to 3D figures at conveying information. No argument there. I'd just rather see them on a flat 2D map than on an isometric map.

I'm also not sure how many different types of units you really want to be able to represent on a game of this scale that has to use so few units because of the lack of stacking. If you were dealing with a 2D map and stacks of units in each hex, the more the merrier. But if you are dealing in an abstraction that only allows one type of unit in a huge area because the game scale has reduced the Alsace-Lorraine border to three hexes, I think you want to represent the differences between armies by adjustments to their combat values rather than with discreet, separate units. I don't recall that there were many army-sized artillery or anti-tank units deployed by the germans in WW II. You just don't have room for many types of units in the force-mix if you can only put one type in each hex.

The Advanced Third Reich sprites are very nice, but still suffer from the Columbia Games wooden block effect that I mentioned earlier. I'm also not sure I agree with its choice of unit colors -- I much prefer uniform colors as the basis for that kind of thing, and apart from the Luftwaffe, German units wore feldgrau or pearl grey.

[Desert Dave]

I don't recall that there were many army-sized artillery or anti-tank units deployed by the germans in WW II.

Sheer numbers do not tell

The whole of the tale, IMHO, Philippe.

Aggregate and combined FIRE-POWER -> does.

For one example among multiples,

I have to agree with the many SC Cats

Who have mentioned that Artillery,

Most especially for the Reds,

And - the Red White & Blues,

Was particularly effective and devastating.

And, no need for stacking,

That has, to my mind, become an archaic

And overly complicated gaming mechanism.

You CAN surely have multiple unit types

EVEN at this 50-60 mile-per-tile scale

And not have that dreaded (... maybe, to me

merely)

Task-mastering AKA - click, CLICK

Clicking!! through & through

The seemingly interminable stacks. :eek:

You just don't have room for many types of units in the force-mix if you can only put one type in each hex.

Sure you do!

Just reduce ALL the other OOB's sleightly.

Which would ALSO have the great effect

Of allowing more blitz

And less potential bog.

I much prefer uniform colors as the basis for that kind of thing, and apart from the Luftwaffe, German units wore feldgrau or pearl grey.

Yep, and the beautiful Swede - Ilsa, wore blue!

Well,

The uni's may have been mostly feldgrau,

But the deep dark heart

Was strictly... sehr, sehr schwartz.

And so,

As mentioned, THAT color scheme

BEST re-presents an image, a perception

Of what the GErman Volk, circa ~ 1932-1944,

Were all... about.

Nein?

[SeaMonkey]

Yah see, this SC cat gets it, but he always has, nicely said DD.

How do we get these other guys to imagine that no stacking is necessary? All that is required is a projection of the effect. Doesn't mean the unit has to actually occupy the adjacent tile/hex/territory just be in the proximity to convey its effect.

What is so hard to imagine about that? Its just like those SC upgrades, you click, spend the necessary MPPs and a number appears that conveys an additional effect of having the equipment.

It works like that for combined arms also except in a different manner that you now have to contemplate. Don't be lazy, use your brain, that's a beneficial byproduct of these games, mental exercise.

[pzgndr]

I'm also not sure how many different types of units you really want to be able to represent on a game of this scale that has to use so few units because of the lack of stacking.

At some scale, only one unit can practically occupy a specific space, so it's up to the game designer to define those things. Where games have stacking, it's assumed there's more space in a given tile or hex or whatever and so more units can occupy a region.

I got around the stacking problem in my A3R mod by simply doubling the map scale. For 1 hex there are now 4 tiles, so a couple of ground units, an air unit and a HQ or other specialty unit can fit where they would in a single hex. Seems to work OK, but still.

The challenge with stacking is how to visually present all that information to a player via a computer game's interface. In Schwerpunkt's Anglo-German War, some hexes had stacks of over a dozen units where ground, air and naval units were colocated. Then there's the challenge of how to select unit(s) for different movements and combats. It's not impossible, just a challenge - for both the programmer to code and the player to use. Thus the great appeal of the no-stacking Panzer General style game...

The Advanced Third Reich sprites are very nice, but still suffer from the Columbia Games wooden block effect that I mentioned earlier. I'm also not sure I agree with its choice of unit colors

Colors are easily changed using MS Paint to whatever players would like them to be. My "choice" of colors was to use the original color set as close as possible, with a few updates based on the current A World At War. For the wooden block effect, this can also be modified by removing the shadowing in the bitmaps. Turn the tile grid off and use flat 2D icons and you more or less render moot the arguments about the isometric map and stand-up icons.

Great thing about the Editor and all these bitmap files is that everything is so easily editable. Players can pick and choose from mods or create their own customizations.

[Philippe]

My copy of the bundle pack finally appeared at my door yesterday, so I've started work on this again. An awful lot of files that need changes to their flags.

No pictures yet, but I've done a WWII-era Mexican flag, a pre-Chavez Venezuelan flag (seven stars, the horse running in the other direction looking over his shoulder), a Brazilian flag, an Argentine flag, and new flags for Hungary, Romania, and Iran.

I'm currently following the CMBB model that puts the royal coat of arms on the Romanian state war flag. It's not clear to me that there is a state war flag, but there may be a war flag. I've seen several references to errors in the flaggenbuch, so if anyone has a handle on the pre-communist state or military flag of Romania, I'd like to hear about it. I think I'm using the right flag (it's not a simple tricolor), but I'm not completely sure.

At this point the only simple tricolors that I'm using are the French, the Dutch (or is that Luxembourg?), and the Belgians. I've sort of convinced myself that the flag for Manchukuo is right, but I haven't played a game of the world scenario (or even the basic game for that matter), so I can't tell if the Indochina protectorate flag is appropriate or not (my guess is that it is). Any comments on Asian flags would also be appreciated.

At the end of the day I don't think you really need a program to make these flags. I just wish it were a little easier to manipulate their palettes.

[mustang96]

Philippe

I'm wondering if you will be releasing your flag's to the general public. I'm very interested in the German one's. I had some great flags for the game on my old computer but lost them when i got my new one.

Thanks

Mustang

[Philippe]

The short answer is yes.

I plan on releasing a full flag mod for all the scenarios that come with each game. That's a lot of copying and pasting after I finish making the flags (which I have pretty much done already). I'll post the final result at CMMODS. My intention is to set up the end product so that after you unzip it to a holding folder you can just copy and paste it into the root directory of each game.

I'm still in a bit of recovery mode though as I just finished sorting a couple of thousand scenarios for CM. As soon as I stop seeing double...