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Megagun
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Melee status bar (idea).
« on: October 08, 2004, 07:56:52 pm »

Today, I was playing a bit with Melee.... Nothing ususal, not for the fact that I was actually running it in 320x240 resolution mode on this crappy 233mhz PC...

I set up two teams, and hit the "BATTLE!" button...



Yay.. PC's Avatar versus my Podship.. Eat THIS, Avvy!! *finger above primary weapon-key*
Suddenly... something hit me... It wasn't a ball, or a bad Umgah joke... no.... I saw this:


Holy resurrecting Pkunk! Loads of wasted screen space! HOOT!!! There go my battle tactics, my secret plans to kill off my enemies entire fleet!!!! I'm DOOMED!!!! How could I have missed this each time when I was playing Melee? How?? Did someone pull off a Somebodyelsesproblem-field?? Who? Ilwrath, perhaps? Or would it be a stupid Umgah, with one of his jokes? Or was it a Androsynth, hacking his way through UQM (that's it: The 'synth hacked their way out of the game!!! Nothing to do with another dimension...)

After some thinking ("Whoa, I can think!!!"), I came up with this little idea.


Aha! If I do a suicide run with my Mycon, fireing it's primary weapon when I'm close to the Avvy, I die....... to launch my Shofixti Scout (barely visible: only 3 or so pixels.. Wink ) and kill off the irritating Avvy, which would practically result in Victory for me... Needless to say, I won the match, with my supreme (cough) tactics....

If you need a magnifying glass, please reconsider that this looks good in fullscreen, or any higher resolution mode. 640x480, anyone? The white square around a ship means that it's currently battling...

For the 320x240 users, there might be a special feature which replaces the small ship pictures with "name tags", which consist of the first two letters of an alien race (or something different, like Ur-Quan becomes Uq) followed by the first letter of it's ship.

List:
AnG, ArS, ChB, ChA, DrM, EaC, IlA, KaM, MeT, MmX, MyP, OrN, PkF, ShS, SlP, SpE, SuB, SyP, ThT, UmD, UqD, UtJ, VuI, YeT, ZfS

If you can't make out which three letters mean what: go play a bit more UQM!

having a score indicator somewhere in the melee screen would be nice, too..You know... something that displays the remaining score of your fleet..

Oh, and a little help for everyone which wasn't able to find out which 3 lettercode meant which (nooooobs..) Tongue:

Androsynth___Guardian______15
Arilou_______Skiff_________16
Chenjesu_____Broodhome_____28
Chmmr________Avatar________30
Druuge_______Mauler________17
Earthling____Cruiser_______11
Ilwrath______Avenger_______10
Kohr-Ah______Marauder______30
Melnorme_____Trader________18
Mmrnmhrm_____X-Form________19
Mycon________Podship_______21
Orz__________Nemesis_______23
Pkunk________Fury__________20
Shofixti_____Scout__________5
Slylandro____Probe_________17
Spathi_______Eluder________18
Supox________Blade_________16
Syreen_______Penetrator____13
Thraddash____Torch_________10
Umgah________Drone__________7
Ur-Quan______Dreadnought___30
Utwig________Jugger________22
Vux__________Intruder______12
Yehat________Terminator____23
Zoq-Fot-Pik__Stinger________6
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #1 on: October 09, 2004, 03:09:36 am »

Quote
List:
AnG, ArS, ChB, ChA, DrM, EaC, IlA, KaM, MeT, MmX, MyP, OrN, PkF, ShS, SlP, SpE, SuB, SyP, ThT, UmD, UqD, UtJ, VuI, YeT, ZfS


Showing both fleets in the empty spots is a decent idea, but I oppose putting the list in for any reason. It would look ugly and even veterans would have to ponder a little to remember what that all means.
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Chrispy
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #2 on: October 09, 2004, 06:27:07 am »

Sounds like a good idea to me. What about moving the second player up and putting a map in the bottom right corner (wiht planet and everything)?
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Sander Scamper
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #3 on: October 09, 2004, 12:47:41 pm »

I like it, and it was fun to read, too =p
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #4 on: October 09, 2004, 05:30:36 pm »

Thanks! ^^


Ofcourse, this idea should be optionable.. Like turn it off or on.. You don't want to scare people newbies, really... off with this, now do you? Tongue

The little text idea was mainly for 320x240 resolutions, as some people might think that those icons are small as... well... small as.. Xchagger... I mean... errr.... Flying zooplankton! Ofcourse! Xchagger? Do those even EXIST? No! Sc3 doesn't exist either!

However, the core team wouldn't probably spend their time on this little idea... Where is StarFire when you need them?

Little map showing planet and the ships? Nice idea... Or perhaps have an indicator showing where the planet it, TimeWarp-style...

Perhaps have the emptyness show funny captain quotes, like "Die! Dgrunti-belly-licker!" *taps glory device* Wink

Ofcourse, it should all be optionable... Smiley
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Sander Scamper
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #5 on: October 10, 2004, 02:10:50 am »

While we're at it, why not redo all the ship graphics?

Add a fluid energy bar and funny graphics for the ship captains?

Why not completely redo the game?


I liked the little icon idea, but personally, I'd rather have 0.4 rather than all of this. =p
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #6 on: October 10, 2004, 03:01:23 am »

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I liked the little icon idea, but personally, I'd rather have 0.4 rather than all of this. =p

I don't think you're the only one around here...

Although I'm not one of the people howling "Pure port! Pure port!", I think focus should be on finishing the "pure" part as soon as can be done, with new stuff added in only if it's no trouble to implement. Not being a coder, and not having seen the source, I don't know which of the two categories this falls under, but it DOES look kinda good.
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #7 on: October 10, 2004, 04:21:23 am »

I believe the UQM codebase is described quite well in Dante's Inferno, Canto IV:

Quote
Obscure, profound it was, and nebulous,
So that by fixing on its depths my sight
Nothing whatever I discerned therein.

Wink
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #8 on: October 10, 2004, 09:08:52 am »

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I believe the UQM codebase is described quite well in Dante's Inferno, Canto IV:

Wink

I think it should be taken one step further. Add a "warning" page, where is quoted this particularily memorable passage from Inferno, Canto III:

Quote
I am the way to the city of woe
I am the way to eternal sorrow
I am the way to a forsaken people

Abandon all hope ye who enter here
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Re: Melee status bar (idea).
« Reply #9 on: October 11, 2004, 05:06:38 am »

I named my firewall "inferno" (for obvious reasons). If you try telnetting to it, you get that verse, but then complete, alongside with the Italian.
It's another translation though.
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