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alterworldruler
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Posts: 501
Registered: 10-06

I'm sure you are not surprised that i'm making this one, well this is Xenus 3 Apocalypse for Gzdoom (Gzdoom 1.4.00 and up required), a sequel to Xenus 2: The New nightmare which wasn't bad but not that good either. I'm taking a completely different approach to this project than with others. I take it slowly to design every bit I want etc. however let's roll.

This project started WAY BACK in September 2008 (You hear it right), originally as a ST-exclusive mod however it was scrapped (I'm intending to remake a map from that version in future.), then it became a remake of old Xenus 2 version (2 years older than the IDgames one) however it also failed. I decided to bet on something that I would call, magnum opus of my experience and mapping. This project is gonna show the best I can do, without wasting any potential due rushes (No rushing is a rule in this project until the end!). I hit a wall when I realised that I can't pull this off alone, so I did hire Paul (yes NMN) to help me with weapons and other custom stuff and Whoo (a good guy, TNT2 leader, that guy is dedicated and does help even with maps inside). So if this is supposed to be my magnum opus then i'm gonna take a bullet and try to create something I haven't done before, something massive, something original, SOMETHING that will be a total conversion. This is what Xenus 3 is now, a total conversion for gzdoom under works.

Planned stuff:
- 40+ maps and 7 acts of story.
- Custom guns (All of them are done thanks to Nmn)
- Custom Monsters (2 of them are done, we have decorate done for half of those however they won't get sprites any soon due Nmn leaving for a while until March/April for reasons I cannot speak of).
- Complex gameplay that is different from Doom (The pace is different here, you buy stuff using money you have, there's a new ACS dialogue system by Jimmy implemented however I modified it for my own needs, kudo to Jimmy)

What is done so far:
- 1 map that is basically a tech demo, I must warn you that it is very buggy but there are no game breaking bugs (map02). The main line of gameplay is playable until the end however the WIP sections in the map are not availble for players. Including the dining room in last shot i'm working on.
- A test map (map99) showcasing first bunch of monsters however here's the catch, while first two monsters are sprited, the rest aren't so they are basically decorate reeditions of Doom 2 monsters for now (Explained in x3monsters.txt)
- All 9 guns are done (More info on them in x3weapons.txt)
- Lots of textures, using NMnCorp1, 2 and leftovers from unfinished Nmncorp 3.
- Lots of tracks that will be used in Xenus 3 (Thanks Nmn)
- The first bunch of monsters however only 2 will have original sprites for now.

Now here comes the important part, i'm looking for people who will help me start this project up for real. You must use doom2.wad as the IWAD (in doombuilder) but don't use any resources from it mkay? Use the replacements which are explained in x3monsters.txt.

Here's the kind of people i'm looking for:
- Map designers who will help with creating new maps. ONLY if they will to be active consistently. I DO NOT want few rooms per month and this kind of stuff!
- A texture designer, WE DO need more textures! We do need Tech, City textures (best if they were apocalyptic, they will get in handy for ACT 2)
- An experienced tester who will test through the map 100% and provide a detailed description on bugs and stuff.
- A graphics designer which will design small items like keycards etc. we WILL need that soon.

Here's the current staff as of now:
Project Leader: Alter
Mappers: Alter
Music Composer: Nmn
Monster Designer: Nmn
Weapon Designer: Nmn
Texture designer: Nmn
Project hoster: Wartorn
Testers: ArmouredBlood, Whoo

Keep in mind that Nmn is leaving until March/April for reasons I cannot speak of so we'll need some assistance.

I'm gonna give you the links to weapon and monster doc but ALSO the build itself, YOU NEED to run the pk3. Wad file is merely for iwad faking stuff. For editing? Extract the pk3 and do the rest there.

Weapon doc: http://www.phenomer.net/hosted/Xenus3/x3weapons.txt
Monster doc: http://www.phenomer.net/hosted/Xenus3/x3enemies.txt (ignore the x3arena or x3gore part as that stuff is already in PK3, the test map is map99 if you're interesed)
Public pre-alpha: http://www.phenomer.net/hosted/Xenu...pha18public.zip

Want screenshots and the layout of first hub (Act 1)?
Here you go pal: http://www.phenomer.net/hosted/Xenus3/hubmap.png
the map screenshots? Here you go too!
http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0106_223955.png
http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0106_223942.png (WIP)
http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0106_223846.png
http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0106_223826.png
http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...1230_133400.png (WIP)

I would appreciate any help. Thanks, Alter.

Last edited by alterworldruler on 02-06-10 at 17:51

01-06-10 22:31 #

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CeeJay
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Wow! Looks like a completly new game.

01-07-10 08:30 #

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alterworldruler
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Posts: 501
Registered: 10-06

CeeJay said:
Wow! Looks like a completly new game.

Well, that's what i'm intending to pull off in general CJ. Though it may take me more 2 or 3 years to do it because I want to release a complete product, maybe not without flaws but with everything I want or wanted to see happen here. The first hub is pretty simple in it's design as the map shows, no complicated puzzles or anything. The basic objective of the map is shown on the hub map whenever it has one, basically anyone who takes a map from this hub, should look at the hub map and figure that the map has only one exit (same as entrance IF the map has one exit on the hub map). However i'm gonna give the freedom from here, they can do whatever they want in the map as long as they can stick to the theme and put in the basic objective for example, finding Jacob's card in the Staff Sector. I hated the puzzles in Hexen anyway so that's why here, it is simple to figure out and player just needs to wander around in the maps (read: do their main lines of gameplay) to progress.

01-07-10 08:45 #

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CeeJay
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Quick question: What is the intended way to get it running? Do i just load the .ZIP file with GZdoom? Because that didn't work for me, it just told me that the map was missing THINGS.

01-07-10 09:15 #

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alterworldruler
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Posts: 501
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CeeJay said:
Quick question: What is the intended way to get it running? Do i just load the .ZIP file with GZdoom? Because that didn't work for me, it just told me that the map was missing THINGS.

Extract the zip file and drag&drop Xenus3rs.pk3 over gzdoom. You can't run a zip file inside the zip file.

01-07-10 09:18 #

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ArmouredBlood
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Looks very cool, I like the monster concept sketches, and I look forward to what weapon 9 is going to do (swiveling mini-radar dishes that stop when firing hint at some nuclear weaponry ;). Slowing down when at/below 50 hp was annoying though, someone somewhere commented that it makes it even harder to survive when you need that speed most.

I'd contribute in mapping, but I map boom, close to no experience with (g)zdoom. If you'd like some general zdoom-feature-less maps to spruce up sure I'll contribute ...

01-07-10 22:03 #

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alterworldruler
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ArmouredBlood said:
Looks very cool, I like the monster concept sketches, and I look forward to what weapon 9 is going to do (swiveling mini-radar dishes that stop when firing hint at some nuclear weaponry ;). Slowing down when at/below 50 hp was annoying though, someone somewhere commented that it makes it even harder to survive when you need that speed most.

I'd contribute in mapping, but I map boom, close to no experience with (g)zdoom. If you'd like some general zdoom-feature-less maps to spruce up sure I'll contribute ...

I got an idea ArmouredBlood, how about you will learn zdoom in hexen format thanks to this project? I mean, you could learn the format with the map you would contribute to this project :) I WOULD'NT mind if the gameplay is like of boom's map as long as you follow the hub map (read: example if you have to get jacob's card, put the jacob's card as some sort of keycard for now). Weapon 9 does shoot, you just have to press altfire to ready it (Safety mechanism to prevent dumbasses from killing themselves) then press fire. Though a zdoom in doom format would be fine too ArmouredBlood, I would just convert it later using Zwadconv and possibly put the title of the map and author etc. Is it okay? One thing dude, do not use any doom 2 resources outside those decorate replacement monsters which will act like their sprites counterparts in future. :)

PS. If you do make a map with contains one exit in hub map, then put that exit in, i'll convert the map later and possibly connect the map to Security Complex (a planned hub map which will interconnect everything)

01-08-10 09:18 #

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ArmouredBlood
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Heh, well I'll give it a go, the last time I mapped in zdoom;hexen I was trying to make some boss fight map for a beastiary boss fight map megawad. Needless to say it never got off the ground ... I kinda liked what I had for it though. Very primitive 3D floors though. Never got the hang of slopes though ... Really it's the ACS I can't stand, I took a semester of C++ and I never want to do something similar again -.- Parameter based actions are fine.

Enough rambling, I'll see if I can't whip something up. Would you mind if I had some placeholder music? And how about length of map? I understand it's going to be the first hub but do you mind if I do some slaughter sections? And that brings up weapons ... how high am I allowed to go? I think the nuke thing is off, and wasn't really sure how powerful 8 is (wind/force thing right?) so 2-7 are fair game? Probably limited ammo for the higher stuff yea. This 'staff section' is going to be interesting ;p

01-08-10 09:55 #

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alterworldruler
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Posts: 501
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ArmouredBlood said:
Heh, well I'll give it a go, the last time I mapped in zdoom;hexen I was trying to make some boss fight map for a beastiary boss fight map megawad. Needless to say it never got off the ground ... I kinda liked what I had for it though. Very primitive 3D floors though. Never got the hang of slopes though ... Really it's the ACS I can't stand, I took a semester of C++ and I never want to do something similar again -.- Parameter based actions are fine.

Enough rambling, I'll see if I can't whip something up. Would you mind if I had some placeholder music? And how about length of map? I understand it's going to be the first hub but do you mind if I do some slaughter sections? And that brings up weapons ... how high am I allowed to go? I think the nuke thing is off, and wasn't really sure how powerful 8 is (wind/force thing right?) so 2-7 are fair game? Probably limited ammo for the higher stuff yea. This 'staff section' is going to be interesting ;p

About placeholder music, use PUMP music for now (it's in the wad by the way). length of the map? Depends on what map you're taking, the map should end on the moment you take the key to some location I mentioned earlier. OR include more traps if you get the key etc. then the map will truly end. I would'nt mind slaughter sections as long as they're not absurdly hard. About weapons, you're not allowed to go higher than the fire shotgun (slot 4) :P

01-08-10 10:56 #

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ArmouredBlood
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Ok, started an atrium for what I guess will be the staff sector, but I'm unsure on how to load the map with the xenus pk3. I tried just dragging and dropping both onto gzdoom, but since I made the staff map 2 (didn't realize 2 and 3 already had maps) I think it's not accepting it or something, idk how pk3s are loaded. If I have to place the map inside the pk3 every time I want to test it it's going to get annoying ...

Btw I didn't find PUMP in the music folder or main, is it somewhere else?

01-08-10 17:09 #

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alterworldruler
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ArmouredBlood said:
Ok, started an atrium for what I guess will be the staff sector, but I'm unsure on how to load the map with the xenus pk3. I tried just dragging and dropping both onto gzdoom, but since I made the staff map 2 (didn't realize 2 and 3 already had maps) I think it's not accepting it or something, idk how pk3s are loaded. If I have to place the map inside the pk3 every time I want to test it it's going to get annoying ...

Btw I didn't find PUMP in the music folder or main, is it somewhere else?

About the loading map thing, take map04 as your map. ALSO it's kinda obvious. If you use doombuilder 2, this is easy because you set xenus3rs.pk3 as your resource wad. If you want to load both xenus 3 and your map in gzdoom. Just do -file Xenus3rs.pk3 yourmapname.wad and it will load. That's how I do it :) however if you're not using DB2, you'll have to because editing the wad with DB1 is pretty much, impossible.

01-08-10 17:24 #

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ArmouredBlood
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Alright it was just being map2 that was messing it up. So ... which elevator do you like better? ;) only an hour's work or so, need to fix the midtextures -.-

http://i49.tinypic.com/f43fhs.jpg
http://i45.tinypic.com/vwvewz.jpg

01-08-10 17:45 #

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alterworldruler
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ArmouredBlood said:
Alright it was just being map2 that was messing it up. So ... which elevator do you like better? ;) only an hour's work or so, need to fix the midtextures -.-

http://i49.tinypic.com/f43fhs.jpg
http://i45.tinypic.com/vwvewz.jpg

Second, you do realise the transparent texture was infact a grate texture? looks LIKE slumped fucked up the transparency of the texture :(

01-08-10 18:22 #

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ArmouredBlood
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Yeah the second one looked like a grate, but it looks pretty cool this way, reminds me of some of the light railings from metroid prime. In fact I'd suggest adding in a solid bar of that color in varying heights to make some cool railings. Might do that with the force texture too (solid red line, will work well for reactor core detail too imo).

So how would I go about making the upper bars of the elevator have the midtexture but not the entrance?

01-08-10 18:52 #

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alterworldruler
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ArmouredBlood said:
Yeah the second one looked like a grate, but it looks pretty cool this way, reminds me of some of the light railings from metroid prime. In fact I'd suggest adding in a solid bar of that color in varying heights to make some cool railings. Might do that with the force texture too (solid red line, will work well for reactor core detail too imo).

So how would I go about making the upper bars of the elevator have the midtexture but not the entrance?

Well, since it looks cool as a light railing, it should stay that way then. Also i'm not a good texture guy :P

01-08-10 19:01 #

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Gez
Why don't I have a custom title by now?!

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alterworldruler said:
Second, you do realise the transparent texture was infact a grate texture? looks LIKE slumped fucked up the transparency of the texture :(

Looks more like people thought that "cyan means transparent" was true outside of XWE. :p If you've got a PNG with cyan areas, they'll be cyan, not transparent. Use the PNG's alpha channel for transparency instead.

01-08-10 19:09 #

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alterworldruler
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I've got something to discuss. I thought of doing a test city map which would showcase quests etc. something like strife's city map. If I had to do it, you do realise guys that this would change gameplay completely? Your survival would depend on this stuff as you would earn stuff in those city maps etc. but not in storyline maps. that applies to you too armouredblood, so basically we'll have to watch our gameplay and not make it like Doom's. On other hand i'm working on new areas in Facility Gate, including a 2-story bedroom in staff section.

01-11-10 14:16 #

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Pavera
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The screenshots in the OP give me a real Daikatana vibe. That's not a bad thing.. I liked the look of Daikatana.

01-11-10 14:31 #

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ArmouredBlood
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alterworldruler said:
I've got something to discuss. I thought of doing a test city map which would showcase quests etc. something like strife's city map. If I had to do it, you do realise guys that this would change gameplay completely? Your survival would depend on this stuff as you would earn stuff in those city maps etc. but not in storyline maps. that applies to you too armouredblood, so basically we'll have to watch our gameplay and not make it like Doom's. On other hand i'm working on new areas in Facility Gate, including a 2-story bedroom in staff section.

Heh, just from messing around with a few of the monster replacements I found the gameplay to be quite a bit different from doom's. In fact it feels a lot more like what I'd think F.E.A.R. would be like (only watched LPs of that game).

Btw ... it's funny that former humans drop more powerful weapons than the sergeants but they're still less dangerous ;)

01-11-10 19:25 #

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alterworldruler
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Alright, after speaking with Whoo I have decided that after i'm done expanding Facility Gate (new screens will show up when the expansions of it are complete), i'll try to do Outer city, a small, independent of story map. However i'll need to pull the basic concept in it first then expand it all over the map. How is your map going ArmouredBlood, any news? I would like to see 2 WIP shots from it if it's good enough to show.

01-13-10 21:11 #

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alterworldruler
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Hello! I'm alive! I'm still workin`. I scrapped expanding Facility Gate temporarily because I have to do Outer City first (important concept map, when finished possibly will be contained within next pre-alpha, public that is). Outer City is a map independent of story, it's a map you can optionally explore and play. You may get some rare items there if you know figure what do stranger. Outer City however is a city full of social outcasts, outlaws, psychopaths on every corner. So take a gun with you! Anywho i'm dropping a screen from the entrace (which you'll use off Security complex). Oh and hey armouredblood, how is your map going?

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0124_160101.png

01-24-10 16:46 #

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ArmouredBlood
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Sorry for not replying to your pm, was thinking of replying after I got some work done on the map ... but then I had some ideas for another map, and have been doing that. So yeah ... still not much more than 2 elevators, an entrance, and a little break room.

01-24-10 16:59 #

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alterworldruler
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ArmouredBlood said:
Sorry for not replying to your pm, was thinking of replying after I got some work done on the map ... but then I had some ideas for another map, and have been doing that. So yeah ... still not much more than 2 elevators, an entrance, and a little break room.

That's fine, i'm a bit busy myself but i'm still working on this project. By the way guys, we are still searching for mappers, graphic designers, testers and texture designers! Any help would be gladly appreciated to start this project up nicely.

01-25-10 07:29 #

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alterworldruler
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Hey, i'm still doing fine yet I'm still looking for mappers (is everyone that busy? :P). I'm working on Outer City as I speak and so far, I succeeded in implementing one of key mechanics in cities thanks to Whoo. Burglary... BURGLARY?

Yes Burglary, there are some buildings which you can enter from unusual ways however it's not as good as I wish (I can't implement translucent breakable glass due Doom in Hexen's limitations and UDMF doesn't solve that either for me). Here's the catch, the closer you are to residents, there's a bigger chance they'll be alarmed of your presence (It's done by giving hack inventory items executing chance scripts via A_JUMp etc. also the linedefs serve as radius. As in each close linedef gives bigger chance of shit happening). however it's worth risking your back as you can sometimes find valuable items or cash necessary to buy stuff in the city.

Okay so here's what is done so far in Outer City:

- 2 buildings (The white one is showcasing the burglary mode)
- Entrance
- Burglary mode

and here is what i'm gonna do:

- Implement sidequests (Gah, I lack original sprites for NPCs :( so I have to use strife ones for NOW)
- Implement the massive alarm system (MASS), what is it? It warns all cops in the city of your presence if you kill someone outside, no matter who he/she is, if that does happen. You're screwed. REmember cops can't hear shit what you're doing inside, so use it. Oh and more cops will start arriving from the entrance too haha, even Commandos to track your back down!
- Obviously do the whole location divided into 5 or more districts (I'm currently doing the Train station district/poor man's)

Here is what I need:
- Sprites for NPCs, they have to be made from scratch, no edits or anything, sorry but this is a TC.
- New Money Sprites (for 1, 5, 10 and 25 bucks each)

That's it, by the way i'm gonna post 2 screens of what I have done so far (heh).

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0126_120056.png
http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0126_120200.png

01-29-10 10:57 #

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alterworldruler
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I'm working on the city as we speak however... due the fact that Whoo/ArmouredBlood are very busy and do not map at all for this project. I'm demoting them down to testers position. Just saying, Xenus 3 is not a project for people who keep sidetracking with their projects. To put it, only mappers who do really wish to spend much time with this project, will be welcomed warmly. I don't want to be an asshole but i'm kinda dissapointed by recent results.

In short, i'm only searching for mappers who are willing to map for this project actively without sidetracking. Do I have any side-projects? Not really. I gave Zero Invasion to my pals, scrapped Dark Caliber 2 to just work on this. However I can't do all of this shit alone. Sorry but I HAD to rant.

Here comes the happier part now, screenshots!

http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0204_175930.png
http://i37.photobucket.com/albums/e...0204_175947.png

02-06-10 17:49 #

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