Version 1.01.777 Available

[Brit]

Notable Fixes:

- Fixed bug: The scenario editor forgets player restrictions if you edit the map-setup settings.

- Fixed bug: Players were allowed to do per-turn open-market trades

- Added a page to the game-manual for the "Unit Description" window.

- Bumped up the version from 1.0 to 1.01 because it was triggering a bug that users weren't being automatically notified of updates

- Fixed lockup (turn processing never ends) that can happen when sending Units to join a UnitGroup

- Fixed bug: sometimes unit-groups cannot target enemies

- Improved some things with unit-groups and orders, to make it more intuitive

- Fixed bug: National Summary information was wrong if you weren't Player 1.

- Added "Show All Paths"/"Show all Orders", and a hotkey (K)

- Fixed bug: Nuclear Bomber was showing up on the idle-units list even though it had orders

- Thumbnails are automatically added to map/scenario uploads

- Fixed a bug in the download system - only the first paragraph of the "Description" section was showing up

- Fixed a lockup during Turn Processing

(There is also an update for the demo version, in case anyone is running the demo.)

[Rosseau]

The improvements keep coming. Thank you!

[MagicKoji]

Yes, thank you. I do have one question though. What is the timeline for having the ability to change or update images for units. Because right now, you can change the statistic, but not really create new units. I really look forward to having that ability.

[Warspite2]

Nuclear Bomber? Wow I never even knew they had those in this game!

[Boris Balaban]

Nuclear Bomber? Wow I never even knew they had those in this game!

If you can fly them in (AA)

[Makris1821]

If you can fly them in (AA)

I find a nuclear strike against a couple of unsuspecting cities a good way to start a sneak attack ... get's things off on the right foot. I agree though, potential AA loses do make these things very expensive.

[Brit]

Yes, thank you. I do have one question though. What is the timeline for having the ability to change or update images for units. Because right now, you can change the statistic, but not really create new units. I really look forward to having that ability.

Right now, there is a possibility to adding new units, but it's not very user-friendly. I plan to add a user-friendly interface to this before I say it is "available".

If you want to start messing around with new unit images right now (before the full user-interface is available), what you can do is go down into the directly structure. Go to "\Data\Images\Units". You'll see a bunch of directories there, one for each unit-image. Go into "UAVHeliBomber" and you'll see "_ImageDesc.unit" and 17 image files. The 17 image files are 16 rotations of the unit + one image ("UAVHeliBomber-r10-c.png") where the UAVHeliBomber is centered in the bitmap, white background, no alpha channel. The "_ImageDesc.unit" file is just text. You can open it up in Notepad. The file is very small, and the parts you're interested in say:

"ImageBase=UAVHeliBomber"

"OnSelectSound=%Sound%\Select-Jet-A10.snd"

The ImageBase tells the game the base-filename for the images ("UAVHeliBomber" is the first part of the "UAVHeliBomber-r00.png" filename). The OnSelectSound tells what sound to play when the unit is selected (those are files inside the "Data\Sound" directory).

So, if you want to add some new unit images, you can use UAVHeliBomber as an example. All you need to do is add a new directory with your own name - e.g. "\Data\Images\Units\SuperTank". Copy the "_ImageDesc.unit" file to the directory, and create images following the same format as in the UAVHeliBomber directory - 16 images (32 bit png) + one centered, white-background, no-alpha image. Then, create a ruleset (you can start with the one of the existing rulesets). The image will automatically be included in the unit-images list. There's nothing in the game that causes it to load-up only my specified unit-images. This will at least get you started building some new unit images. It will work fine on your own system.

Things get a little more complicated with animated units, like tanks and infantry, so I won't go into it right now.

There are some problems if you try to upload your own ruleset to the game-server or try to play a multiplayer game with someone else using your ruleset, though, because it will reference unit-images that do not exist on their system. Once I get the full unit-image system working, it will handle these complications.

I'm unsure on a timeline for the full system. Maybe a month or two until the full system is implemented, but it also depends on other issues that I'm working on.

[MagicKoji]

Right now, there is a possibility to adding new units, but it's not very user-friendly. I plan to add a user-friendly interface to this before I say it is "available".

If you want to start messing around with new unit images right now (before the full user-interface is available), what you can do is go down into the directly structure. Go to "\Data\Images\Units". You'll see a bunch of directories there, one for each unit-image. Go into "UAVHeliBomber" and you'll see "_ImageDesc.unit" and 17 image files. The 17 image files are 16 rotations of the unit + one image ("UAVHeliBomber-r10-c.png") where the UAVHeliBomber is centered in the bitmap, white background, no alpha channel. The "_ImageDesc.unit" file is just text. You can open it up in Notepad. The file is very small, and the parts you're interested in say:

"ImageBase=UAVHeliBomber"

"OnSelectSound=%Sound%\Select-Jet-A10.snd"

The ImageBase tells the game the base-filename for the images ("UAVHeliBomber" is the first part of the "UAVHeliBomber-r00.png" filename). The OnSelectSound tells what sound to play when the unit is selected (those are files inside the "Data\Sound" directory).

So, if you want to add some new unit images, you can use UAVHeliBomber as an example. All you need to do is add a new directory with your own name - e.g. "\Data\Images\Units\SuperTank". Copy the "_ImageDesc.unit" file to the directory, and create images following the same format as in the UAVHeliBomber directory - 16 images (32 bit png) + one centered, white-background, no-alpha image. Then, create a ruleset (you can start with the one of the existing rulesets). The image will automatically be included in the unit-images list. There's nothing in the game that causes it to load-up only my specified unit-images. This will at least get you started building some new unit images. It will work fine on your own system.

Things get a little more complicated with animated units, like tanks and infantry, so I won't go into it right now.

There are some problems if you try to upload your own ruleset to the game-server or try to play a multiplayer game with someone else using your ruleset, though, because it will reference unit-images that do not exist on their system. Once I get the full unit-image system working, it will handle these complications.

I'm unsure on a timeline for the full system. Maybe a month or two until the full system is implemented, but it also depends on other issues that I'm working on.

wow. Thank you for the information. I will check it out. Because I have been itching to make some new units. Might as well make use of my 3d background.

Thank you.

[MagicKoji]

I know this sounds a little crazy. But I was looking at the images of the units. And well, I'm amazed at what you did with 64x64 pngs. But I was wondering, if there is any possibility that the game could use larger images say like 128x128. And that the game engine can zoom them in our out of them. I will put some example images up later this evening. Of the mod I would like to try to do.

Thank you, and keep up the good work

[MagicKoji]

one more question? Will it be possible in the future for different players/country to have their own units. or at least different images of the same type of unit. as an example. Americans having Sherman tanks, Germans having Tiger Tanks.

Thank you.

[Big Mike]

Great update Thanks !

[Brit]

I know this sounds a little crazy. But I was looking at the images of the units. And well, I'm amazed at what you did with 64x64 pngs. But I was wondering, if there is any possibility that the game could use larger images say like 128x128. And that the game engine can zoom them in our out of them. I will put some example images up later this evening. Of the mod I would like to try to do.

Thank you, and keep up the good work

I can modify the unit-image structure to allow for more detailed images, say 128x128 and resized so that they appear smaller on normal, 100% zoom. One concern I have about doing that is with the memory usage. Right now, a 64x64x4-byte image uses up 16K of memory. The 16 rotations brings that up to 256K for a single unit. Adding animations on top of that (say 9 frames of animation for the tank x 16 rotations) adds up to 2.56 MB. Now, if you're loading a bunch of units, you can see that memory usage adds up. That's before switching to a 128x128 image size, which is 4x the memory. Graphics cards can compress images so it's not quite that bad in reality. I suppose that using 128x128 pngs isn't quite so bad if you aren't also using a bunch of animations.

Another possibility is that the unit-images could use more of the 64x64 space. I know some of the unit-images I'm using don't use-up the full space. I might be able to figure out some clever code-tweaks that could minimize memory use. For example, off the top of my head - loading a 128x128 image, clipping the image down to the used area of the image, then resizing that to exactly 64x64. That would keep memory usage down by keeping images within 64x64 while maximizing image quality in that space.

[Brit]

one more question? Will it be possible in the future for different players/country to have their own units. or at least different images of the same type of unit. as an example. Americans having Sherman tanks, Germans having Tiger Tanks.

Thank you.

The rules system does allow for certain players to have access to certain technologies and units. There isn't anything available to simply swap-out the image while using the same unit statistics.

[Emmeth]

Yep, improving units' pictures would be great. Nowdays almost everybody have at least 2GB so it won't be a problem.

The main concern is that it might be hard to distinguish between unit versions so a better graphic will help a lot, above all a new player, IMO.

[MagicKoji]

Another possibility is that the unit-images could use more of the 64x64 space. I know some of the unit-images I'm using don't use-up the full space. I might be able to figure out some clever code-tweaks that could minimize memory use. For example, off the top of my head - loading a 128x128 image, clipping the image down to the used area of the image, then resizing that to exactly 64x64. That would keep memory usage down by keeping images within 64x64 while maximizing image quality in that space.

Hi Brit,

I understand the limitations of memory, but like Emmeth said, most people I believe have more than 2gb of memory. if not more. I have render some images of what I would like to use for my mod. And you can really tell the difference between the two sizes. And I believe you need the extra space you have around it, since the units have to rotate 360 degrees. If it was just a counter, then you could get away with just having a profile.

also, is there a way to take a poll to just see how much memory people have. Because I know I'm not the norm, but I have 12gbs on a windows7 x64 machine.

Thanks,

Koji

[Brit]

Hi Brit,

I understand the limitations of memory, but like Emmeth said, most people I believe have more than 2gb of memory. if not more. I have render some images of what I would like to use for my mod. And you can really tell the difference between the two sizes. And I believe you need the extra space you have around it, since the units have to rotate 360 degrees.

The original image needs to have blank space around it, but it's possible to do some tricks to clip the image and move the "center" of the image to a new location. It would have to be done in the software, though, because it gets too complicated and confusing to do it by hand.

also, is there a way to take a poll to just see how much memory people have. Because I know I'm not the norm, but I have 12gbs on a windows7 x64 machine.

Thanks,

Koji

Based on a quick look at the bug reports (which includes the amount of memory on a person's system - just in case it's relevant to their issue), I'd say that 2GB is the most common amount of memory, then 4GB, then 1GB.