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I'm planning on updating this post every Friday from here on out, just so I have more time to polish stuff a little before revealing it.
Here are some of the ideas I've been playing around with. Some of the more advanced ideas would a lot of time and resources to make available, but I would like to make them happen at some point.
Definite Additions
- Fully functional mech lab
- All the mechs in physical form
- Proper geometry for weapons
- Standard/Founder textures
- Various Decorations
- Proper Geometry for each weapon
- Import/Export for other mech labs
- Music/HPR/NGNG Podcasts
- Multiplayer (acts as a merc/faction HQ)
- NPC's wandering around
- Customizable decorations (put hula girls wherever you want them)
- Tactical planning room for missions (shows all game maps, maybe interactive surfaces)
- Live weapon test area (no mechs, just weapons and their GFX/SFX. Think R&D)
- Dedicated server
- Canteen
- Multiple mech bays for customization (up to 8 people can all edit mechs at the same time)
- Some form of custom clan/merc/house integration (custom merc emblems, for example)
- Live map of the innersphere for community warfare in OP/News Room
- Import/Export mech designs from game
- Lounge with Solaris 7 streaming on TV and sofas
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Most Recent Video:
Concept:
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10/11/2013
Still plugging away. Nothing fancy to show but the UI, but a few of the things I'm designing are:
1) The UI for setting the mech in each gantry (the idea is that there are several gantries and you can set each one to have whatever mech you want.
2) Working on the lighting system, computer monitors, and tweaking the elevator system to use gui textures instead of meshes (switches, buttons, etc).
3) Technicians working on mechs. This won't be random, but probably unique for each mech (think the mechanic sitting on the atlas shoulder). Some ideas are coolant refillers, electronic repairs, running diagnostics.
The latest video shows me testing the gui, including a quick and dirty elevator button (yes they're going to look better).
The first mechs you'll be able to play with are the phoenix package. "What? Gasp! Boo!" Okay, so maybe it seems a bit random to do that, but consider the fact that not everyone could afford to purchase the overlord tier and/or the saber upgrade. This gives those people a way to look at the mechs without being shot by them.
I'll see about adding another video or two over the weekend.
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10/04/2013
Well, we had a tornado, massive winds, sideways rain and I came down with a strange bug. My goal for next Friday is to have the interior walls for the mech lab completed, along with the devices used for manipulating the mechs in real time.
Also, if anyone has models that can be used for mechwarriors and wants to donate them, let me know and I'll happily include them. I prefer .obj files with seperate diffiuse, specular, and normal map files. Pre-rigged is much preferred. Animations are also welcome as long as they are compatible with human armatures. I can work with .fbx .3ds .dae, and .blend files as well though.
These need to be game ready though. Nothing with 100,000 polys please... Around 8,000 - 15,000 is fine.
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9/28/2013
I haven't had as much time to work on the mech lab as I would like. I'm actually working towards a new job in the next few months (fingers crossed) but it means spending time out on the campus that I may be getting the job at.
Anywho, I don't have anything super pretty to show off this week, as I've been working on pulling mech, weapon, equipment, and module icons from the game files for use with Mercpedia. I've also been working on extracting the mechs for the mech bay. The original 6 or so mechs are fairly easy, but PGI changed their asset pipeline for all of the newer mechs. Instead of being a single model, they're in pieces like a lego set.
This means I have to extract the part, convert it to quads, remove doubles, orient it correctly, then re-export it for the game engine. Once in the game engine, I have to snap all the pieces together to assemble the model. This is why all the newer mechs have custom geometry for weapons, while the older mechs do not - the new stuff is fully modular. The downside is that it's a pain to organize them for GUI integration. But before I can do that, I have to bulk rename all the models from *.cga to *.chr. So there are a lot of small steps on the path to mech enlightenment.
So how many parts does a mech come in? A lot:
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And with another 4 models set to be released in 17 days, I'm going to be extremely busy just extracting and prepping models from the game - let alone making unique assets for the rest of the mech bay.
Can I advertise my merc/faction/clan/guild/party/unit?
Yes. I'm looking at donation based advertising in a few ways.
Recruitment posters tacked around the public mech bays. This space will be limited and offered on a first come, first served basis. The unit will be responsible for providing the recruiting poster, but I'll outline the dimensions a quality requirements. They're pretty easy to make.
Radio ads played over the comm system as part of the ambient noise. I will look into streaming HPR into the mech bay, so that will kill two birds with one stone. The idea is to create an immersive environment similar to the radio station.
Custom mech labs for units. This would involve getting custom decals and unit insignia around the mech bay. However, this hinges entirely on a multiplayer component, so is on the wish list, not necessarily the to-do list.
This is basically to cover the costs of running the server and potentially adding more features. For example, I could use Miximo to very quickly animate models to walk around and create more ambiance than a deserted office building. This would take a lot of time for me to do manually, but $30 at Miximo would have it done in about 5 minutes.
As for bandwidth costs, Smurfy is putting his daily traffic at 12 gigs. That's for an entirely text based site. That means this could easily run over a hundred gigs per day in traffic. Yikes. If this gets out of control and would require fully monetizing the mech bay, I'll switch it over to be completely offline (just download the executable and go).
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9/20/2013
Where's the Update!?
I'm working on it!
I've been sidetracked by other, life sustaining, projects. I've been trying to clear them up so I can spend the weekend on the mech bay.Currently, the plan is to make the mech lab browser based instead of a stand alone installation. Why? Well, two major reasons:
1) The purpose of this is to allow you to experiment with mechs without using the mwo client - if you're at your computer, then you have access to the MWO client, and what's the point? This will allow you to do it on the go.
2) Updates are seamless and there isn't a bunch of emphasis on client patch management.
This will be cached on your machine, so if you're stuck somewhere without net access it will still work. Mind you, this is all subject to change depending on how much bandwidth is devoured every month. However, this is what we are aiming for right now.
Will This Ever Turn Into a Game?
No. The idea behind this is to make an extension for Mechwarrior Online, not to replace it. As such, you won't be able to die (no matter how many times you jump off the gantry), there will be no small arms, health, armor, etc. It's strictly for simple pleasures like battlemech viewing. I think the mechs so far look pretty phenomenal and I think it's a waste that we can't walk around and admire them. So that's pretty much what this will revolve around.
Release Timeline
I *hope* to have a working beta of the mech bay within the next 2 or so weeks. This will be public and open to anyone who wants to give it a go, and will only include the mech bay, not the full lab. In other words, you'll be able to select a mech and change it's geometry, but not swap out weapons and equipment.
Have Questions?
Go ahead and ask. I'll try my best to answer.
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FAQ
Q: How are you getting these mechs?
A: Heffay created an excellent tutorial on this subject here.
Q: How can I help?
A: If you really want to help, you can extract a few mechs, remove the doubles and convert to quads for me. If you're interested, shoot me a PM.
Q: Will you take donations?
A: Yes, when it's closer to completion.
Q: Can I advertise my in-game faction/Merc Corps/House/Company?
A: Yes. I'm still hammering out the details.
Q: How much would you like for advertising donations?
A: I'm not sure yet. I'm not trying to monitize this, but getting enough to cover bandwith, hosting, and maybe some cool extras would be nice.
Q: When will it be released?
A: I wish I could give you a firm date, but it depends on how busy I am and how quickly things come together. Before Christmas? I hope...
Edited by S3dition, 11 October 2013 - 06:29 PM.
but its still a posibility.
