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Topic Starter Topic: Re: EntityPlus - A single player Q3 mod

Cool #9
Cool #9
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PostPosted: 12-21-2011 08:06 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


ah ok ty :up:




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I'm the dude!
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PostPosted: 12-21-2011 06:28 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


It's mostly working out alright, mostly.

Image

I had a hell of a time unwrapping that model and getting 3ds Max to render out the lightmap. Something strange was happening to the UV's on the green cube, so I trashed it and remapped it. FML.



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Cool #9
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PostPosted: 12-22-2011 01:29 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


heh, it's looking pretty good though :up:




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The Afflicted
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PostPosted: 12-23-2011 06:28 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


@obsidian: Is that going to be an official MOD menu background or is it more of a personal project of yours?



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Cool #9
Cool #9
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PostPosted: 12-23-2011 06:39 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Both. It's something obsidian made to test lighting compile stuff (correct me if I'm wrong obs) but he kind of donated it to become the background for the mod's main menu. He also made the logo model. The current release of the mod includes a version of the model that's kind of alpha so he's working on improving it and getting himself some good headaches in the process ;)




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The Afflicted
The Afflicted
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PostPosted: 12-23-2011 06:47 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Obs would actually release something map-related? Then get the man some aspirine! :D



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Insane Quaker
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Joined: 28 Dec 2009
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PostPosted: 12-23-2011 04:17 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


tehSandwich wrote:
I cannot go pass the open door after the fight against Anarki.

This is a strange issue indeed, and I've done some testing now and found the reason why I missed this issue when testing my map. When I test my map, I was using a shortcut. The shortcut runs quake.exe directly with some parameters, such as: sv_pure 0, g_gametype 8, devmap, etc.

But the parameters don't matter with regard to this issue.

I did some more testing, and I found out that the cause is when you load my map using the EntityPlus menu system--where you select your Skill Level as well--and click Okay.

So, it appears the solution would be that you simply goto console, and type "/map krep1" to load it directly. Make sure that Quake3+EntityPlus is loaded properly, and that sv_pure is 0, and g_gametype is 8 before using "/map krep1" command.

Eraser wrote:
Looks like there's some clip bru... ... For some reason though, there is a "nobots" key on that invisible door. ... ...

I added "nobots" because I assumed bots would trigger doors--even though it was not shown in the entity defs--I added it anyways. : )
I added it because I saw the bot trying to go out there, and so I figured I'd add "nobots"--thinking it wouldn't hurt anything if I added it. hehe

Quote:
This key was introduced in v1.1 and prevents bots from opening the door, so now suddenly the invisible door refuses to open.

I'm not so sure though if the issue is my map--or more specifically the unnecessary "nobots" property, which I assume could be ignored by the mod's programming.

I loaded my .map in GTKRadiant again today and reviewed my entities, targets, and targetnames; and everything looks correct.

Any door with targetname can only be activated by a target--which now I realize that means I don't need a "nobots" anyways, but yeah--and that targetname is set to the same value as the deathtarget from the bot. Everything looks good in my map. So, maybe we can do something with the mod? What do you think, Eraser.

Quote:
This key was introduced in v1.1 and prevents bots from opening the door, so now suddenly the invisible door refuses to open.?

hmm. interesting.




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Cool #9
Cool #9
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PostPosted: 12-24-2011 02:27 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Deqer, what are you on about? The issue has been identified and a fix specifically for your map was introduced in version 1.1.1 of the mod.




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Insane Quaker
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PostPosted: 12-24-2011 02:38 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Yeah, I updated/tested with 1.1.1 and the issue still happens if you run the map from the EP menu.




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Cool #9
Cool #9
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PostPosted: 12-26-2011 02:01 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


EntityPlus 1.1.2 released

I've updated EntityPlus to version 1.1.2. This version fixes some problems with scoring where the game reports the wrong number of secrets and the wrong accuracy. Sounds familiar? Yeah I thought I fixed that in 1.0.2, but apparently the problem still occurred when running the game as QVM. During development I compile to DLL and then the problem didn't occur. Really strange.

But this release should fix it for both QVM and DLL. I suggest everyone replay their maps again because you're bound to get a higher score this time around ;)

Oh, it also sneakily introduces a "wait" key for info_waypoint entities.




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The hell good boy
The hell good boy
Joined: 22 Jun 2011
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PostPosted: 01-01-2012 03:46 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


There is a problem: When player restarts game (the map), he have only machinegun. I've registered it in Testing Procedures campaign. I had only Machinegun in final battle with the AI computer. Is it possible to make any buffer for inventory at start of map? If so, then player will have all items which entered the map, when restart game.



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Trainee
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PostPosted: 01-06-2012 04:48 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Could we get a new grenade launcher spawnflag to create teleporting grenades like as (somewhat) discussed in this thread viewtopic.php?f=16&t=46340 ? (the spawnflag would specify that the GL would only shoot teleporting grenades)
This could introduce some cool new puzzle-solving scenarios for mappers to challenge players with.




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Insane Quaker
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PostPosted: 01-08-2012 01:15 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Is there some way in your mod to deactivate some kind of shader after 3 seconds? Let's say a monitor starts a movie and afterwards it should turn itself off and can't be turned on again? Or is it already possible in q3a?




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I'm the dude!
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PostPosted: 01-08-2012 05:42 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote




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Cool #9
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PostPosted: 01-09-2012 12:22 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Yeah it works but I've never got it to work reliably myself. Shaders do swap but afterwards, there is often some weird graphical artifact, like weird colors on the new shader. Not sure what causes it, as the technique is used correctly in Team Arena.




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Theftbot
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PostPosted: 01-09-2012 12:47 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


-seems to work for me




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The Illuminated
The Illuminated
Joined: 08 Sep 2000
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PostPosted: 01-09-2012 09:29 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Bliccer wrote:
Is there some way in your mod to deactivate some kind of shader after 3 seconds? Let's say a monitor starts a movie and afterwards it should turn itself off and can't be turned on again? Or is it already possible in q3a?


This is indeed possible in vanilla Q3 but you will have to make sure you got the latest patch (1.32b) release. Most of the effects I did in my Forever map used the TA shader swapping feature. I also released the source files of the map if you want examples (http://www.simonoc.com/pages/design/map ... source.htm) Remember to use editor filters and camera clipping so you can move around the source map easily.

Eraser wrote:
Yeah it works but I've never got it to work reliably myself. Shaders do swap but afterwards, there is often some weird graphical artifact, like weird colors on the new shader.


The shader swap function does not work correctly with lightmap stages and causing fullbright and/or visual corruptions. Split the light stage into a different shader so the swapping only affects the texture stage and layer them on top of each in the editor. I had this problem with my forever map and solved it by splitting the shaders. Also the shader swap feature does not reset back to original state when the player dies or respawns which could cause problems with visual clues or progress in a SP environment.



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I'm the dude!
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PostPosted: 01-09-2012 10:01 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


LOL... sock. I was searching for our PM discussion about this problem for "Forever" and you beat me to it.

Perhaps the player spawn could trigger a relay which resets the original shader state might work to solve the respawn problem?



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The Illuminated
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PostPosted: 01-09-2012 10:24 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


obsidian wrote:
I was searching for our PM discussion about this problem for "Forever" and you beat me to it. Perhaps the player spawn could trigger a relay which resets the original shader state might work to solve the respawn problem?


The problem with resetting shaders at the beginning of a map reload is that you can cause the client command line to over run and crash the game. (1024 chars is the limit) The TA shader swap feature always seemed like an engine hack to me and not something that can be done on a larger scale. Ideally there should be a new feature created for this, maybe Eraser could code something better?

Here is my PM about shader swapping, if anyone is interested ...

My story so far ...

Solution 1: Originally I used a pair of func_door/buttons to switch shaders around. This was easy to implement and it worked a treat, but Q3 has a 255 hard limit on func items and it is extremely easy to hit this limit if you have multiple brushes for each shader swap. Both brushes have to be in the same position and one has to be moved on start (func_door-start open function) in order to get the lightmaps looking right. The func_ items were moved with -1 speed (instant move) and had the added bonus of additional sound attached to the func_ commands. I originally thought the -1 speed thing was instant but it is not, on one rare occasion I was standing on top of a func_ item and it pushed me upwards as it travelled 'instantly' to its new position. Not really an ideal solution as I was pushed out of the map into the void.

Solution 2: Setup multiple brush surfaces with different shaders and used the remap command via various trigger relay/delay entities. The off shaders were triggered on start of the map to be empty so the 'on' shader was visible. Getting a nodraw texture past the compiler was tricky at first but eventually I settled on the following shader:

Code:
   qer_editorimage textures/common/black_nodraw.tga
   surfaceparm nomarks
   surfaceparm trans
   {
      map textures/common/black_nodraw.tga
      blendFunc GL_ONE GL_ONE
      rgbGen const ( 0 0 0 )
   }   


The trans was needed because the on/off shaders were on top of each and the compiler would randomly remove one. (it usually depended on which one was found first in the map file)

This solution heavily relied on the 'off' shader being setup at the beginning of the map correctly and I soon found a couple of new Q3 hard limits. When the remap command is run, it is instantly run, no delay and several at once will cause the client command line to over run and crash the game. (1024 chars is the limit) Each setup trigger had to be batched and delayed so they did not all happen all at once. The second limit was a maximum of 128 remap shader commands per map and with duplicates for each trigger this can be reached very easily as well.

The final problem is when the remap command is used, the engine assumes the shader assets used in the target shader are cached/loaded into memory and if not will cause huge fps drops (20-40) while it is loaded. The target shaders have to exist somewhere in the map before the remap command is used, so a small gallery box with a target shader is required.

Other compilications come from the shaders and the best results are when the source/target shaders share similiar/same amount of stages. Going from a 1/2 stage shader to a 4/5 stage shader will again cause huge FPS drops. Going down in stage numbers is fine but huge leaps upwards in stages can be serious. I found the best number of stages to use was 3 (lightmap+source+blend). Some of the more compilicated shaders I was testing with had multiple stages of tcmod commands which again 'seemed' to cause fps slowdowns. Eventually I tried to keep all tcmod stages to a bare minimum and not make the target shader too complex.

Solution 3: Based on solution 2 but removing all the startup remap triggers and using only one shader surface instead of two. The start up of the map was getting to be a huge problem with timing co-ordination and it was easier to just setup the source shaders in the shader file first. This solution involved re-working all the shader file but it did mean the map did not have any startup lag issues.

Unfortunately this solution still had one big problem, lightmaps. When the remap command is used the lightmap on the source shader is broken and will often randomly be full bright, black or a different colour shade to existing surfaces around it. I tried various shader tricks to fix the problem (tcgen lightmap, stylemarker and lightmapscale) but nothing worked 100% all of the time. If anything the various extra shader options just made the problem worse and even more random on which remap surfaces would be broken next compile.

Solution 4: Split the remap shader into two parts. The section to be remapped from the original shader was split into a separate part while the background + lightmap stayed static. Again the shader file had to be re-worked to fit with the new layout but it worked perfectly. The target shaders were cached via the gallery box, the remap shader were single staged so no weird engine redraw lag and best of all, the lightmaps were perfect across all surfaces being remapped.

Example shaders:
Code:
// ----------------------------------------------------------------------
// Stuff to remap (sits on top of background)
textures/moteof/trlit_on
{
   qer_editorimage textures/moteof/switch_on.tga
   surfaceparm nomarks
   surfaceparm trans
   {
      map textures/moteof/switch_blend.tga
      blendfunc GL_ONE GL_ONE
      rgbGen wave sin .8 .3 0 0.25
   }
}
// ----------------------------------------------------------------------
// Background + lightmap shader (base)
textures/moteof/trlit_background
{
   qer_editorimage textures/moteof/switch_background.tga
   surfaceparm nomarks
   surfaceparm trans
   {
      map $lightmap
      rgbGen identity
   }
   {
      map textures/moteof/switch_background.tga
      blendFunc GL_DST_COLOR GL_ZERO
      rgbGen identity
   }
}


The stuff that needed to be switched on/off was in a seperate shader and using the previous nodraw shader (above) it was simple to use. Each instance where the shader was required, two patches were created. One had the background shader + lightmap and the second one had the remap shader which was switched on or off depending on remap state. Patches were used because the texture co-ordinates need to align up perfectly and brushes at weird angles do not always work correctly.

Final solution involved no extra func_ entities, two patches (background and remap surface), various trigger relay's to activate the remap commands and the target shaders cached in a gallery box. The remap shaders were all single stage and this was good news for the engine fps.

I have literally spent weeks on this trying to find the best solution and I think I have found a good one but I imagine the best solution will probably come from ydnar as he knows what the compiler is doing to the remap shader surfaces. (unfortunately he has left the Q3 scene so it is impossible to get his input anymore)



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Trainee
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PostPosted: 01-13-2012 05:06 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


(please ignore my last post.)




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Immortal
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PostPosted: 01-18-2012 04:30 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


so i downloaded the 1.1.2 release, and the entities.ent file. installed everything. ran the bat file. it loaded up a black screen then quit to desktop and avg went nuts and deleted my quake3.exe. then demanded a restart. very weird... anyone else had this?

oh and i got the files from https://code.google.com/p/entityplus/downloads/list




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The hell good boy
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PostPosted: 01-19-2012 05:14 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


fKd wrote:
so i downloaded the 1.1.2 release, and the entities.ent file. installed everything. ran the bat file. it loaded up a black screen then quit to desktop and avg went nuts and deleted my quake3.exe. then demanded a restart. very weird... anyone else had this?

oh and i got the files from https://code.google.com/p/entityplus/downloads/list

That's strange... I load the EP from desktop (made shortcut for quake3.exe and copied the settings in bat file), you can make it too...



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Cool #9
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PostPosted: 01-19-2012 05:31 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


fKd wrote:
so i downloaded the 1.1.2 release, and the entities.ent file. installed everything. ran the bat file. it loaded up a black screen then quit to desktop and avg went nuts and deleted my quake3.exe. then demanded a restart. very weird... anyone else had this?

oh and i got the files from https://code.google.com/p/entityplus/downloads/list


That's really odd. There aren't any exe, com or dll files in there. I'm pretty sure AVG is having incorrectly reporting issues here (unless your system was already infected). I use AVG on Win7 (32 bit) myself at home and I don't have this problem, even when I run the mod as DLL files.




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Immortal
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PostPosted: 01-19-2012 02:48 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


time to do some scans etc i guess. god damn it...




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The Afflicted
The Afflicted
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PostPosted: 02-12-2012 04:19 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Just updated to the latest EP build.
The entity.def wasn't updating properly in my GTK install so I copied it directly into the gtk 1.5 q3 game folder.
After that the entitiy.def works fine, but my texture browser is messed up. I've got random shader image not found black and blue texture everywhere. The map compiles fine, it's GTK I've broken something in.
Anybody have any idea what I've done or how to fix it?

//edit:
Forgot to mention GTK is finding some of the texture/shader in a texture/shader folder, but not all of them




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I'm the dude!
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PostPosted: 02-12-2012 06:12 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Do you have a shaderlist.txt in your Entity Plus scripts directory?



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The Afflicted
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PostPosted: 02-13-2012 02:56 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Oops....lol, who put that there? ;))




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Cool #9
Cool #9
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PostPosted: 02-14-2012 12:48 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


EntityPlus includes a custom shaderlist.txt which is just the default one that comes with GtkRadiant (1.4) and the "entityplus" shader added to the list. This shader file includes a common/ladderclip shader that's used to create ladders. So if you have your own shaderlist.txt, add "entityplus" to the end of the list.




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Grunt
Grunt
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PostPosted: 02-19-2012 07:40 AM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Seems kind of quiet lately, hasn't been update since January 10.



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Cool #9
Cool #9
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PostPosted: 02-19-2012 11:26 PM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Well spotted. Have a cookie.

In all seriousness though, I don't consider the mod "dead", but I did put it on the back burner for a little while. I've got some other things going on in real life and most of the free coding time I have goes into working on a simple 2D game I'm making myself.

But besides that, the truth is that the last two major releases of the mod pretty much added features that I needed for my own "Testing Procedures" map. That map was the source of inspiration I needed for more features. Currently, I'm kind of dried up on ideas for the mod. So unless someone comes with a feature request that I can code in relatively easily, don't expect any big updates any time soon.

I am playing around with some ideas for a new map for the mod though, and undoubtedly that will lead to me implementing some new features in the mod.

Right now, the idea is to release a new version of the mod some time. I'm just not quite sure when that time will come.




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Insane Quaker
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PostPosted: 03-01-2012 05:29 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


I'm not in the mood to read through 20 pages, so I'll ask my question here:

Is there a possibility of making func_breakables that can only be broken with a specific weapon? And if so, would it be possible to make it act like a normal brush as opposed to a shootable thing with weapons that can't break it (if a func_breakable can only be broken with machinegun, gaunting it shouldn't be a hit, and grenades shouldn't explode on it).

I had an idea recently for making a minecraft map, where every block is a func_breakable, but it would suck if rocketjumping broke the blocks too. Also I wouldn't be making the map as I'm not nearly smart enough to know where to begin.




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Cool #9
Cool #9
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PostPosted: 03-02-2012 02:53 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


That currently is not possible, but it's something that could be implemented yes.




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Trainee
Trainee
Joined: 30 Jun 2010
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PostPosted: 03-29-2012 05:12 AM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


An idea for a entitiy.
Like func_gravity but for timescale.
So that a mapper can modify the timescale ..




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Insane Quaker
Insane Quaker
Joined: 26 Nov 2009
Posts: 341
PostPosted: 03-29-2012 03:08 PM           Profile Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


Going for a bullet time?




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Trainee
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PostPosted: 03-29-2012 03:34 PM           Profile   Send private message  E-mail  Edit post Reply with quote


can be bullet time, but also faster
One silly idea: A map where more and more monsters come, and the game becomes faster and faster. How many seconds do you survive? Seems to be difficult to find some use for it, since it would affect everything.




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