GodlikeRez
The SecondLife of Nexii Malthus
aRTS: The Next Level
August 2nd, 2008 by Nexii
Massive Leaps..
..that is the progress of development I have achieved, my original strategy game that started a year or two ago has jumped into a new revival; And now I have powerful LSL scripts Arcs completed vital to certain basic foundations:
- Linked-Tier Hierarchy
Imagine being able to simulate a skeleton, an entire avatar, or rather a mechanical structure and being able to flexibly adjust one piece of the limb with each child following suit. Basically I would be able to easily mix&match some prims to make a tank and effortlessly turn the turret to face enemies while leaving the main body in the direction of movement. I could even put a small machine gun turret ontop and have that turn around to face a different threat!
- Heavily optimized A* Pathfinding
I now have in my possession the ability to do realtime pathfinding in LSL itself just about sufficient and effective enough to be capable on running on multiple units at once.
- Pseudo Random number generator (+Perlin Noise)
Doesn’t sound interesting but it means something special to me, first off all I would be able to assign listener channels specific to my units for damage control on a much more efficient basis than running hundreds of objects on the same heavily spammed channel.
This is an incredible masterpiece of scripting that I was proud enough to give back to the community in a bloody fantastic documented way. Shame it is under-used and most developers don’t know what to do with it, I have heard a fellow game dev make an awesome spaceship battle game whereby the weapons would fire a message that would be intercepted and each spaceship would work out on their own wether it hit it than rely on the shaddy + laggy havok physics. Oh and it means instant-hit weapons such as lasers would actually work properly now without waiting a supposedly instant-hit weapon to reach its target.
Interpolation is quite important and an underestimated aspect of movement. It is useful and in my case could be used for future aircraft as a way to plot smooth transitions and paths from current position to a target and then back, like a bombing mission run coordinated with other aircraft for best potential destruction.
- Physics Library
Just some odd pieced together functions, one of my favourites being a trajectory calculation function for computing the angle needed to shoot an object, such as a bullet or artillery shell, that has a specific initial velocity, also allows for the complementary angle.
- Knowledge of Quaternion math
My new found knowledge of working with quaternion rotations is an incredibly useful asset and can now fully use its potential as seen from my rotation functions in the interpolation library.
- Proper health bars via llSetText
I have now successfully created a low-lag effective way of displaying bars such as for health, shield and/or power on llSetText together with the special block characters.
and thanks to Niles’ help:
- Efficient Encryption
His encryption functions are incredibly simple but very safe that I could even trust handling transaction data between two objects.
- World Coords to HUD
I had been working months on this small piece of code but Niles managed to write it down which I simply couldn’t get down in maths, I am not sure why but I think I had the same thing, Writer’s block that affects writers, except for mathematics. This function allows me to convert a world position to precisely the same location as on the HUD which is vital for certain important ideas I wanted todo in my RTS game.
- Effective synchronized prim animation
I had been planning for a while on this sort of system but Niles beat me to it and I wish on using prim animation for certain cool sequences which will be in the game, primarily what comes to mind is unit and building animations such as when a building is to be constructed I wish it to be quite detailed.
RTS Progress so far…
[ Todo: Youtube video ]
[ Todo: Pictures ]
[ Todo: Well..more stuff here to show what I have done so far 
]
Interface
[ 14:05 10-Sept Update: Ok I got the design done thanks to Taylor Whynn 
]
On a slightly related note I have a hurdle to overcome due my perfectionist/OCD attitude if I wish to keep this project alive.
Specifically, I need my Heads Up Display for my RTS aesthetically complete so that I can script that. I tried to make it but I just can’t do it, so I am asking You in a plead for help, do you know any texture artists/interface designers? Or perhaps are You one? Then please contact me here in a comment or on SecondLife and IM Nexii Malthus.
Some random notes on the interface:
- Basically it has to be an RTS game HUD, like C&C or other strategy games.
- Has to use the least screen real-estate as possible but look good and quick to the point of keeping the player updated.
- Has to have place for a bar of Power/Electricity.
- Place for a counter of the Monies. (ie. how much cash the player has)
- Buttons to sub menus: Build, Design, Research..and something else, can’t remember. Just keep it flexible so I can add/remove buttons/menus.
- I would like it if it fit into the Dazzle skin but isn’t a must.
- Place for icons of currently selected units. They will mostly float under the menu.
- Sub-menus will slide to the right.
- Main menu/Entire HUD will be placed on the Top Left (But actually attached to the Centre2 spot for certain reasons), unless other places may be more suitable?
I will place a reward of 4kL$ if I am happy with it, even though I don’t have much money but rather to show the urge that I need this.
i love second life, but rarely have the time to “play a game” ala WoW or even scrabble. but stimulating a skeleton sounds fun.
umm… simulating? Ohhh. i got completely lost, sorry.
looking forward to seeing one of your projects in action online one day, nexii.
Haha, I was already being scared that no one was reading my blog, thanks for your comment Seraphine
Might have a go at this, need the money
Please send me an online or offline IM if someone beat me to the chase.