Alpha lost soul

[Shapeless]

Does anyone have some screenshots of this lost soul version? or better yet a sprite sheet. thanks in advance. I know one guy has it as an avatar. I've tryied google and found myself going in circles.

[myk]

You should use DeuTex to extract the stuff from the Beta IWAD.

deutex -rgb 0 255 255 -doompr d:\doom\iwad\doom09 -sprite -xtract

(Change the directory to where you have the beta, putting Deutex somewhere with a DOOM IWAD copy.)

[Grazza]

Or download MBF (or WinMBF) and extract them from betagrph.wad using whatever wad tool you prefer.

[Enjay]

Concerning the "Alpha" soul. I get the impression from the Alpha/PRB version and port implementations that it was supposed to have some kind of "psychic" attack. This seems to be basically a hitscan attack. Is there any definitive answer on exactly what this attack was supposed to be like and what kind of sound it was supposed to use. Is the MBF implementation accurate or guesswork?

And on the death frames: when the Alpha soul dies, it leaves a small pile of shattered bones. However, these "jump" up on the last frame or so of animation. A coding or sprite offset problem?

[myk]

Enjay said:
And on the death frames: when the Alpha soul dies, it leaves a small pile of shattered bones. However, these "jump" up on the last frame or so of animation. A coding or sprite offset problem?

The offsets off all the death sprite frames are similar, while the last sprite is shorter than the rest by a good margin, that seems to be comparable to what we see ingame (plus I doubt there would be any sort of property change in the last frame that could do that from the code in the death sequence, which is generally free... except in monsters that trigger map effects.)

[Shapeless]

I don't think it had a pychic attack. I think it spit bullets out of it's mouth, like a gun tounge. I'm just saying cause I'm sure it made the same sound as the pistol.

[myk]

Shapeless said:
I'm just saying cause I'm sure it made the same sound as the pistol.

We don't know because the pre-release beta didn't have sound, but that's very doubtful because the attack doesn't generate bullet puffs. I gather that what Enjay said is more or less correct, and unless they were thinking about adding more effects to it (lets say it'd brighten the target/victim and create a sparks effect on it) I can imagine they considered it rather unsatisfying and too similar to the bullet attack (eventually something roughly similar but more distinct and visual did come up; the Arch-vile's attack.)

[188DarkRevived]

Shapeless said:

Does anyone have some screenshots of this lost soul version?

If I'm not mistaken, this sprite is being used in the X-DOOM project which me and DarkHaven are working on...
It is the grey-skinned lost soul which doesn't have any flames on it's head and explodes into a gree puff of smoke, right?

If those are exactly the sprites that you're looking for, they're being used in X-DOOM. There is a beta version of this mod currently available.
If you run a query search then I'm sure that you'll be able to find the thread which has the download link.
Download it, then use a tool such as WinTex to get the lost soul sprites.

[Terra-jin]

The alpha soul's attack doesn't hit other monsters, which means it can't be a hitscan attack. It's similar to the Arch-Vile's attack as in that it will hit you even if you hide behind other monsters or things.

[Quasar]

That would mean it is a long-range melee attack, as melee attacks (contrary to what some have said) can only hit their intended target since all they do is call P_DamageMobj.

Of course the exception to that are player melee attacks, which do in fact fire short tracers to find a target to hit.

[Combustable]

That's not true, because I know i've seen lost souls accidentally attack others before while trying to get me.

[myk]

Combustable said:
That's not true, because I know i've seen lost souls accidentally attack others before while trying to get me.

This was easy to verify and it seems Terra-jin is quite right; the Imps in front of the Lost souls were not reacting as these zapped at me. The fights you've seem were because if an Imp accidentally hits a Lost soul with a fireball the Lost soul attacks back and a fight between them ensues.

[EarthQuake]

myk said:

This was easy to verify and it seems Terra-jin is quite right; the Imps in front of the Lost souls were not reacting as these zapped at me. The fights you've seem were because if an Imp accidentally hits a Lost soul with a fireball the Lost soul attacks back and a fight between them ensues.

This is correct, I just ran the press release beta, and managed to get an imp back into that room on the third map and got it between me and the lost soul, and it indeed did not hurt the imp.
My question now is, if the imp and lost soul get into an infight, can the lost soul actually harm the imp?

[Quasar]

If it is implemented as a long range melee attack, then the lost soul should be able to hurt the imp. But the imp won't ever get mad at the lost soul first; the lost soul will have to get hit by an imp's fireball first.

Anyways this could be verified by looking at the A_BetaSkullAttack routine in MBF or Eternity, but I'm too lazy at the moment. Lee emulated it in a virtually perfect manner.

[Ringman]

Whoa! I've seen lost souls duke it out with each other! I swear! They'd just dash at each other biting until one would die (usually the one that got hit first.) I think the lost souls act as a projectile when they are in attack mode.

But this was in the actual game not the beta, so I don't know if it pertains to this. It is a fairly rare occurence, but I've seen it on more then one occaision.

[Bank]

Ringman said:

Whoa! I've seen lost souls duke it out with each other! I swear! They'd just dash at each other biting until one would die (usually the one that got hit first.) I think the lost souls act as a projectile when they are in attack mode.

But this was in the actual game not the beta, so I don't know if it pertains to this. It is a fairly rare occurence, but I've seen it on more then one occaision.

I believe that it's established that Lost Souls can attack eachother in the final product game, but the debate at the moment is exactally how the alpha skull attacks, or more on topic, a spritesheet of the alpha skull.

(BTW, I've been looking for the same sprites!)

[Technician]

pasted this together about a year ago. Think I didn't leave out any animations.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v81/geome44/souls.gif

[Shapeless]

thanks technician :D

[Enjay]

Technician said:

Think I didn't leave out any animations.

Well, the final death frame is certainly missing. It's just a pile of shattered bone shards.

[Terra-jin]

The press release version has a more complete and polished sprite of the Alpha Soul.