@nainnad
I wouldn't agree; I think it's more of most people have stuff going on.

That said, I don't think it's a good idea to use C++ for a game project no matter the skill level since many would agree that any performance upgrade over C# is usually not worth the added dev time. The only reason I would use it is to take advantage of the professional grade assets given free from Unreal Engine.

Personally, I use C#/Unity for just about every project (I do full time gamedev), and in retrospect it would have made more sense to start the project in Unity since lots of beginners would likely be interested in contributing however possible, and Unity makes that easier than UE4. One of my current projects is actually an RTS in Unity.

The only reason I'm not right now working hard on OM is because I don't have time to do much more than management and doing code checks/tests. I'd be happy to run or help with the project if there were any willing lead devs and/or artists.

Good luck with C++ by the way! (If only ruby had the speed of C :D )

This is going to be a thread on the progress of 'CMD THE MACHINES,' which is a little javascript project to put you in the (mechanical) shoes of the controller with a classic computer terminal interface. Source can be found here.

Updates on progress will be posted here. By the way, this is supposed to be a short project in free time and I will put it live on a website hopefully soon.

@Pisarz
Haha, so this is OM, I've just put some models down for testing code. So far it's just comprised of unit selection/movement. In Unreal Engine, when you make a basic project, the map spawns with a table and chairs.

The models are from the original game btw.

@Aquarillis
Yeah, I mean I found the designer on linkedin here.

But we were mainly looking at people who dealt with the IP, like people involved in the acclaim auction etc.

@Pisarz Judas Warlords and Scavengers are definitely the way to go for this mission; steal lots of high value units and hold off enemies until your army is big enough to overthrow chokepoints.

@TheOriginalFoxx
Welcome back! Sorry to hear about your issues.

Anyway, as @Encrypted said I'm pretty busy right now, but hopefully will be doing more machines 'stuff' soon.

I also recently bought a copy of machines:

:)

Also would like to have the wiki up, but we're going through a Hayden Hiatus atm (HH for short? haha). I guess I'll shoot him an email.

@Pisarz
So with any program, unless the developer allows it, nothing can be changed by the user.

In other words: Unless the machines developers made the program have some interchangeable path to a video to play before the game starts, it cannot be added or modified. However, since hard coding paths is often a bad idea, programmers can use files to read data that can be added easily without changing code and recompiling.

Moving on, I know that one video is played before the game starts, which is sort of the trailer for the game. So, if there is a file or some changeable option that says "load this video," with proper decoding (you would have to know how it is encoded, unless it's not encoded at all), you could change it to say "load that video."

That's why most of Judas' modding posts are basically file data changes.

Another example is that the images that are shown before the video are loaded, but they are not hidden anywhere and can be seen or modified. So to mod those, one could just replace the picture with a different picture of the same name and have that picture show up when the game loads.

Anyway if someone really wants to put video in the original game, he/she could go ahead and investigate on how the game loads its video at the start and just replace it. I doubt that we would have the ability to add more videos in without changing source though (which isn't available).

With UE4 we're trying to make a very, very early version of a new machines game with just viable AI and netcode, since both don't work very well in the first game. What it will be at the end will hopefully be a community collaboration of ideas.

This thread will contain all of the resources used for OpenMachines. It will be updated with new resources as they're created.

Current Resources:

Github Page - Where the code is located.
Getting Started Page - A quick guide to inform anyone interested in the project how to help.
OM Roadmap - Used to specify which tasks are to be completed next.
List of Units - All units in the original game. *Missing unit values

Upcoming/Desired Resources:

Game Wiki
List of Units to add

@Encrypted @Pisarz

You can always look at machines compared to the current maps since there are trees and other natural objects. Of course you go between planets so the scale depends on your artistic vision for new maps. ;)

Unless you're trying to keep the scales Earth-like.

Picture of WIP login screen:

This one is an actual executable (not just a mockup), except it doesn't do much yet other than accept typing and close. :p

@Pisarz said:

Is it going to be for testing if we can actually establish a link with each other "in-game"? (With in-game I mean if that app can be included in Unreal Engine 4. If not, how would it work?)

There would be a server application for the launcher that would allow players to join and create lobbies. Then, once a lobby is launched, each player's games will start, and the application will tell the game what to do next to make sure all players get in the match together.

The current system I'm thinking for multiplayer is using master servers to host multiple games so that players wouldn't have to worry about hosting. (This might be too server intensive, so I'll do more thought about it once I get to multiplayer in the actual game.)

Here's a post where I'll place resources from the past two projects we worked on.

Models: MachinesModels.zip
Screenshots: MachinesScreenshots.zip
List of Machines: List of Machines.xlsx
OpenMachines Repository (SpringRTS Version): https://sourceforge.net/projects/openmachines/
Machines Legacy Repository (Unreal 4 Version): https://github.com/OpenMachines/machines

Hi guys, @martin created a discord server; this is just a sticky post with the invite link.

Join us on discord here!

Thanks @radwic!

I'm not sure what system you're running on but I've played quite a few multiplayer games without some of these steps. Note that I've always played on Windows 7 as I've found performance problems I haven't been able to get past on Windows8/10.

I've never needed to install IPX Wrapper as we just used the Direct IP option (can't remember the full title of the option at the moment); is there an advantage to using IPX rather than the Direct IP/LAN via Hamachi?

Also note, this game works over LAN if I recall correctly without any third party software.

Stunning work @Pisarz

@Pisarz Judas Warlords and Scavengers are definitely the way to go for this mission; steal lots of high value units and hold off enemies until your army is big enough to overthrow chokepoints.

@marvin Well done, looks great!

@Refragger Not quite, there has been some divided focus on working on a remake project, but there was a lack of commitment. It's a bit difficult to commit to it for me right now as I have a lot going on. That said, I know @Judas was recently using a framework to make a prototype.

@X-Lord Strange, it should ask you to jump to the system in which the planet is, then you would use the orbit command on the planet, then you would launch one of the pods in that vessel.

I just tested it and it is intended to look like this:

Thanks @Radler!

Nice! I've also got it working on Windows 10 before, but I had terrible performance issues. How's your performance?

@Radler Details? Screenshot? What message does it tell you when you try to open it?

@Judas Nice work! As for the models not being centered, you should be able to change the origin to their bottom center in Blender or other 3D software, should make their position based on that origin in Unreal.