Journals

I'm back!
Got the new family computer (Refurbished Office PC for $200, OS included) up, new modem (now external and USB, because the small size of the case) and I'm back online, and it feels so good.
Get some BM wallpaper up, throw around 1 or 20 file folders, and this new computer will feel just like home.

Alright, so after a ton of testing, file transfer, buying a new hard drive, and setting that hard drive to work with the motherboard, the verdict has come in for the family computer; The capacitors on the motherboard seem to have deteriorated and no longer work.
Hopefully we will be getting either a replacement motherboard or a replacement computer soon.

And then I can come back regularly.

No, I'm not dead. The computer is just still giving us problems. When we got the new RAM, that fixed it, for a while. But now the damn thing is freezing and failing to boot again. We just got it back from my cousin, who used to fix computers for a living. He gave it a clean bill of health; booted it, ran dskchk, ran the computer for hours without any ill effects. But as soon as it gets back here, it stops working.

So, I am still alive. I'm not going to stop coming to TWHL. I just can't access the internet on a regular basis until we get this sorted out.

Which really sucks.

Some of you may have noticed a deafening silence as of late. That would be my absence.
Long story short, the family computer is out of commission, leaving only mine able to connect to the internet, and only through the highspeed stick. So I probably won't be around for a bit.
On the bright side, I have a new map in the works. See you (hopefully) soon!

It's that time of year again.
Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah, Joyous Kwanzaa, and have a good day off work because other people believe in things you don't. I think that covers everyone on TWHL.

Peace on earth and goodwill towards everything. Let us not fight over little things such as geographical location, religion, or skin colour. Let us come together in peaceful harmony and make the world a better place.
Because if we don't, we're all screwed.

Happy Holidays!

So, today is the first day of snow in my area, and I have to say, if it weren't for the fact that it was raining all day beforehand (and indeed, for days before that) conditions would be perfect for a snowball fight. W00t.

EDIT: Looks like it sorted itself out. Thanks to all who gave advice.

Well, shit.
It looks like New Vegas has actually killed my computer. So, it crashed, looped the computer like Fallout 3 keeps doing when I'm in tranquility lane. No big deal, right? Just kill the power and reboot. Well, that didn't work too well, because it would just start up in the same state, never getting to bios. So, I left it alone for the night, hoping it would be better this morning. And it was. For a minute. I was listening to music, to try and make sure it wasn't going to crash before I started playing, and as the song was nearing the end, guess what? It blue-screened. Reboot, go the to C:\ drive to locate the files the error report was going to reference, because god forbid Microsoft design it so users can read the actual error reports they're sending out from the error reporting window, and as soon as I clicked on the drive, it crashed.
I reboot, as soon as windows starts up, it bluescreens.
Finally, it froze on bios.
Any ideas? Because I don't know what's causing this, and I doubt I can afford to replace it if it can't be fixed.

Oh yeah, and the current version of Colony 42 is on that computer, too. Crap.

Today's my Birthday. Now, last year, I kinda promised Soup Miner that I'd reveal my age. So, allow me to savor the anonymity for just a while longer... I'm sixteen now. cue dramatic music
So, I didn't get too much this year, but what I did get was great. My friends pitched in and got me New Vegas, which is the first time I've had a game within a week of it's release. My brother and parents used his connections and their money to buy me a 23-inch monitor, meaning that it's now possible for me to run even New Vegas in its max resolution. (If I thought I could do that without my cooling system dying.)
So, small haul, but great quality.

So tomorrow I go in to the dentist to get the first tooth drilling in my life.
Whooooooooo.

UPDATE: The Auto-shottie works perfectly aside from the reload animation- due to the way the engine and editor work, I was forced to use the Assault Rifle reload animation.

I've also discovered that it's really difficult to make weather, and impossible to do without being able to convert files to the format Fallout 3 uses.

Experiment: Create an Auto-Shottie in Fallout 3. (Custom, Unique weapon)
Attempt one: Increase Rate of Fire to that of Chinese Assault Rifle - Failure. When fired, acts exactly like the Vanilla shotgun.
Attempt two: Check 'Automatic' flag (overlooked in attempt one)- Failure. While the rate of fire is increased, and is technically automatic, it does not seem so.
Attempt three: Double rate of fire from the Chinese Assault Rifle and change attack animation to that of the Chinese Assault Rifle- Success!!! As long as you don't mind unloading the entire 12 shell drum in 2 seconds and firing it with one hand.

Secondary testing in Megaton with godmode enabled resulted in a great many gibs, spent shotgun shells, and torsos. Great fun.

Next step: Reduce rate of fire and match hold animation to that of the assault rifle to match with looping fire animation.

Well, my last day of freedom before the school year starts is wrapping up to a close. What did I do this summer? I played video games, went swimming, entered a compo, and generally relaxed.
Damn, I wish I had another month to do the same stuff in.

Well, see you tomorrow around 6:30 AM.

I've been thinking a bit about game AI recently. What makes an AI good opposed to bad. The answer
isn't how smart an AI is. It's how human it seems.

Look at HL2's Combine AI. They're smart (ish), they use tactics, throw grenades, flank, assess dangers, etc. But they don't seem human. Now, in HL2, that's okay; they're not human anymore, after all. But
that shouldn't be an excuse, not for any game. AI shouldn't be designed just for combat.
Now, look at Goldeneye's (the original, of course) AI. They patrol, they scratch themselves, they sneeze. If you shoot them, they don't just flinch from the impact of the bullet (like the combine do in
HL2) they flinch from pain. Shoot a soldier in the hand, he'll bend over in pain, maybe shake his hand. Shoot them in the neck, they might slowly fall to the ground, slowly dying from asphyxiation. For all
their blockiness and comparatively stupid AI, they seem more human than the combine in HL2 do.

Games need more AI that doesn't just stand around waiting for the player and then shoot. Look at the recent STALKER games; NPCs sleep, eat, wander around. The world doesn't revolve around the player, and that illusion of humanity and life is caused by the AI's idle behaviors. In video games,
Guards and Soldiers should guard things and patrol, chatting with any friendlies nearby, whether it's a passing guy on patrol, or the person the NPC is guarding a door with. Scientists should do science. Terrorists should patrol with varying degrees of unease, with a couple guys guarding the hostages, who huddle on the ground, or sleep, or eat their bread and water. Maybe talking quietly amongst themselves until a terrorist breaks it up. Dynamic or scripted, games need more NPC interaction, more idle behaviors.

And I'm tired of trying to sneak up on soldiers, while crouching and moving slowly, I might add, only to have them swivel around as soon as I get within a few feet of them. Unless you're making noise, or they can see you directly, NPCs should not detect you. If you're in a vent, directly above them, they shouldn't be able to always snap their heads up and start shooting. AI has always been too smart, perception-wise. If I want to use stealth for a change, instead of blasting everything, I should be able to
do so successfully, as long as I'm using the basic techniques from HL's hazard course! And hearing needs to be redone for 90% of AIs as well. Running/Walking around in a large military base, for example, shouldn't attract all the NPCs in the level, but a bit of unsilenced gunfire should attract some, with the amount of different shooters and the length of the combat being a key factor on how many come, and whether they run, walk, or tiptoe. The combat tree of
Idle > Alert > Combat > Search > Alert > Idle
Is no longer good enough, the way it's implemented, there need to be different levels of alertness, different levels of search, Search and Alert should go hand in hand if the player has triggered one of
them, and NPCs should start with varying levels of alertness. Maybe the map is set at night, and most of the guards in the building are tired and not expecting anything to happen. Maybe the map is set in a warzone, and there was just an attack on the outpost, so the guards on the outside are alert and waiting for more.

If we're capable of making NPCs with simulated emotions and dynamic AI, why the hell has no one implemented this stuff in full into a game? Even the AI that's heralded for being realistic doesn't have
all of these features implemented. You know what I think? Laziness. If the big companies can keep making mainstream games using no new tech that doesn't involve graphics, why would they spend the
effort on improving anything? The very notion of doing something that doesn't have an immediate personal payoff is lost on them.
Meanwhile, the few companies that might actually be both capable and willing to improve technology,
such as Valve, are too busy to do it. I think that as soon as Valve are finished Ep3, and are working on the 2011/2012 branch of the engine, they should pull a Valve, and implement AI like I've mentioned in the above 5-6 paragraphs, before anyone else is even near considering doing it. (Skeletal animation, facial animation and full, accurate physical gameplay anyone?)

tl/dr: JeffMOD rants about AI.

EDIT: And don't even get me started on flashlights and corpses in relation to NPC alertness.

JeffMOD is back from his cottage!
With no internet, computer, and only 1 channel, I had no pressure for the compo or any other outside source, and not much high-tech stuff to do, and as such spent most of my time relaxing in the form of reading, sleeping and swimming. I also spent some time doing the highly popular activities known as eating and breathing.

My parents are now fighting, so there goes the lack of stress I gained from the last 4 days.

I had a strange dream last night. I was playing Valve's new "Half-life 2 coop" Which was more a TF2 MMO set in the HL world. I was shooting a demoman and a heavy with a paintball gun while running backwards. I ran right off a cliff in the process, and the demo followed. I kept shooting, wanting to kill him before the inevitable fall damage did. In desparation, I switched to my melee weapon (a sword) right before I hit the ground. After I died, the demoman fell on my corpse, impaling himself on the sword, and giving me a postmortem kill. I then did this multiple times because the demo kept running after me.

Well. This sucks.

So, our area is in the middle of a two province-wide heat wave. Normally, this would be bad enough, but the humid air seems to be all too much for my rig- it's normally cool interior heats up within 5-10 minutes of gameplay in Fallout 3. So, basically, I can't really use my PC, limiting me to more or less dialup internet usage and TV as far as electronic entertainment goes- Steam on this computer is halfway through an update as far as I know, and none of the non-steam games on it really pique my interest at the moment.
As for going outside and doing something there, well... I was never the sports kind, and besides, it's too damn hot to do anything active anyways.
[insert long sigh here]