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KeenGraph galaxy

Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2010 5:00 am
by levellass
It's mostly done, to be released with the updated and windows/linux Keengraph, but there are a few small things I'd like to get feedback on from people.


Fonts: Fonts are monochrome letters used in writing text. Each letter is a different width and height. All 'lines' of text are the same height. How should I export this? Modkeen exports as a single bitmap, black and white letters separated by dark grey. I'm currently exporting similar, on a grid of squares the same size (Like the Keen 1-3 'font' 8x8 tiles) with the color reversed (White background, black text, not white text on black)

I could also export each letter as its own bitmap, my previous coding experience has had people do this. If it is exported 'letter by letter' then it would be in separate folders for convenience (e.g. graphics\fount1\letter3.bmp)

So, one big bmp or separate letters, which is better?


Numbering: I'm numbering by chunk number, like the game does. For example, what modkeen exports as sprite 0 is chunk 124 in Keen 4 (This is how the game and patches treat it.) this won't affect anything but the number in the filename, but I think it will help those patching, they won't have to add an arbitrary number when trying to make a patch use a graphic.


Tiles: I'm currently exporting 8x8 tiles as TIL0002-3, 16x16 as 0-1 and 32x32 as 4-5, as modkeen does, since all programs produced look for these default filenames and it could be troublesome to change them. The alternative would be the old wombat game tools masked\unmasked 8x8\16x16\32x32 tiles, which describes what they are and even makes nifty filenames, but would be different from the norm. I would appreciate programmer's input on this, especially since it should be possible to change the number of tiles in Keen galaxy.



Production of TED5 files: Yes or no? (I can edit almost any game with an EGAGRAPH, and that's a lot of games. This includes extracting the levels.)



Grouting: Should I grout the tiles? (For anyone who doesn't know, divide the tileset into squares, similar to the 'grid' option in Mindbelt) This means more effort for me and I wasn't going to grout the tileset, just use a 256 color for masked tiles. I could grout or have a -grout option if there is enough demand for it.


Filenames, especially the tiles:

* Stick with modkeen 2-like filenames

* Do as Lemm suggests, and change the names of everything. I don't want to drop the 'traditional' format entirely, since I'm attached to it.


Any other suggestions and tips are welcome too, this is a new format for me.

Posted: Tue Sep 28, 2010 9:09 am
by CommanderSpleen
levellass wrote:So, one big bmp or separate letters, which is better?
Definitely one bitmap, IMKO. Not that I intend to do any Galaxy modding in the foreseeable future.

Posted: Wed Sep 29, 2010 3:45 am
by lemm
I second one font/bitmap.

Since your masked tiles are going to be 256 colours and grouted (I'm assuming?), I wouldn't think that you have to tie yourself to the exact modkeen names for the tiles, since you're already changing them for the sprite bitmaps anywyay.

My suggestion would be to use the first 4 characters of the filename for the type of data, and the second 4 characters for the chunk number, and dropping the leading episode digit entirely (since you're numbering by chunks, which is a good idea). You could also use more specific filenames; for example, instead of TIL for all tiles, maybe M08T, M16T, U32T, etc...

For files that take up more than one chunk, I would just suggest that you use the starting chunk number.

Adding as much editing capability as you can for the MSCxxx.BIN stuff.

looking forward to it!

Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2010 2:22 am
by levellass
Since your masked tiles are going to be 256 colours and grouted (I'm assuming?), I wouldn't think that you have to tie yourself to the exact modkeen names for the tiles, since you're already changing them for the sprite bitmaps anywyay.
New issue: Grouting. Should I grout the tiles (For anyone who doesn't know, divide the tileset into squares, similar to the 'grid' option in Mindbelt) This means more effort for me and I wasn't going to grout the tileset, just use a 256 color for masked tiles. I could grout or have a -grout option if there is enough demand for it.


At present I'm pretty much doing what Lemm suggests, though I was being more conservative with the file names, going with the traditional xTYPyyyy.EXT modkeen 2 uses. My two file naming options now are:

* Stick with modkeen 2-like filenames

* Do as Lemm suggests, and change the names of everything. I don't want to drop the 'traditional' format entirely, since I'm attached to it.

Posted: Thu Sep 30, 2010 5:20 am
by lemm
Personally I'm not a fan of grouting, since any decent image editing program has an option to display gridlines anyways, and it would interfere with those large panoramic backgrounds seen in keen4 mods. At least leave an option for it.

Posted: Wed Nov 17, 2010 1:20 am
by levellass
Right. Well I'd hoped to be finished by now, but I've had some unfortunate setbacks. Here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3940020/KEENGRAPH.zip is the latest version of Keengraph. It works almost flawlessly with Keen Vorticons (I'm sure some flaws will show up in short order) and will export Keen Galaxy, but due to some persistent issues will not import. (I just want to show everyone how I'm handling graphics.)

Posted: Sat Feb 12, 2011 8:49 am
by levellass
Worked around the issues for now. Beta for galaxy import and export is here: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/3940020/KEENGRAPH.zip

Issues:

* Cannot edit the fonts yet
* Patch files not yet decided upon, patches are provided in the Extras folder
* Speed tricks not implemented, importing takes ~8 seconds


Features:

* No more masks!
* Can edit the terminator text and DOS screens
* Chunks are numbered correctly
* Can have empty sprite, bitmap and masked bitmap chunks


As always, am seeking input and suggestions. (And bug reports... *shudder*

bug fix

Posted: Mon Dec 26, 2011 11:37 am
by lemm
The latest Keengraph (keengraph (41).bas, and keengrap.bas in your dropbox, then one where you started to play around with grouting) was doing some funny things when exporting netkeen tilesets. The last two Unmasked tile16's would be messed up, and then the Masked tile16 tileset would be pushed two to the right (so that there were two empty tiles in the upper left, followed by the ACTUAL masked tile16 #0 at x=32, y=0, and so on).


Anyways, I made the following tweak in SUB EXTGRAPH at line 1140ish:

Code: Select all

  'et(4) = 8u; et(4)+1 8m; et(4)+2 = 16u;
  IF (n > et(4) + 2) AND (LEN(u0) > 159) THEN
   ' et(5) = n - 1 ' is waht this was...
   et(5) = n + 1 
   PRINT "Masked 16x16 tiles start at"; et(5); "..."
  END IF
 END IF    
Changing et(5) = n -1 to et(5) = n+1 seemed to do the trick (rectifies the offset by two in exporting), although I have no clue in hell as to the additional ramifications this change might have...

Posted: Mon Jan 02, 2012 1:15 pm
by lemm
Hmmm, disregard this, as it seems to have broken other things.

Posted: Thu Jan 19, 2012 1:39 pm
by levellord
Well this looks interesting. What on earth has been going on here?