Crossfire - Upcoming changes, upcoming content

but i dont know how to create a texture with dripping glue

but then its leaking air for sure

and i think the textures need some kind of detail, dunno yet what else to add

it is by no means perfect yet

An example of how the rework could look like.

The lighting got fixed and the textures got reworked to have a cleaner and more diversified look. Instead of rendering the details over the entire texture, multiple different details are used on specific areas of the texture instead.

Unfortunately a very time consuming (eventhough not that complicated) procedure.

If someone has some photoshop skills and too much free time... there are plenty of other locations which could need such a treatment.

Old:

deck1old.png

New:

deck1new.png

Despite the still very limited time I managed to get some more work done on the upcoming update.

I am not totally satisfied with the progress but considering how little time I currently have for working on the mod its better than nothing.

A good bunch of new 3d models were finished and are almost ready to put into the mod.

A bit of additional texture work certainly is needed... that really is not my strength but I guess Ill find a way to get it done.

Regarding the Blackstar fleet I decided to go for a token system with three different tokens.

This can be considered a new currency system for the game which is independent from the billions of $ players already have.

Tokens will be needed to craft new equipment.

They will only drop as loot from invading Blackstar enemies.

Like I said there will be three different token types with different values.

The lowest value type will drop from ordinary fighters. The middle value variant will drop from capital ships.

The high value type will only drop from ultra rare elite fighters which have a very low spawn rate.

The economy behind this is still work in progress.

Tokens can be traded with other players.

Other than that they have no value.

The whole token mechanic will only work on the server, not in Singleplayer.

Crafting blueprints can be purchased on Clan bases.

I'll favor of token I was thinking about more useful terms for the three qualities of the items.

Bio-neural microchip

Bio-neural circuit

Bio-neural computer

or something along the lines

I'm trying to wrap my head around all the content changes comming with the Blackstar update. All the stuff was requested, all the stuff I started to work on and partly did not finish yet.

I announced Blackstar to be released in 2021 and the first half of the year was a mess. Way too much RL work and not enough time to actually get modding stuff done.

But in the recent weeks I've managed to get some time redistributed and had the chance to focus a bit more on CF modding.

Since starting to work on the Blackstar update I touched many different topics... e.g. the creation of new 3d models, new concepts, bugfixes,... and in order to give you an overview of what to expect and also for me personally to have an overview of what I still need to work on, I decided to create an early change log/feature list.

(this list is potentially being extended)

• retexturing of Sirius station
• retexturing of station interiors
• redesign/fixes of the launch and landing scripts
• fix of the lighting bugs during cut scenes
• second part of the battleship upgrades (if I get it working)
• improvement to cloud layers of planets (if I get it working)
• surface fixes for Renaissance stations (to prevent random crashes in that area)
• introduction of modular stations to Renaissance space to improve the varity
• one new faction including unique ships and stations
• multiple new systems in the Sol sector
• server side Blackstar fleet invading Sirius and Altair
• server side ship upgrades
• token system related to the Blackstar fleet
• new weapons and equipment
• new bonus mission(s)
• multiple replacements of existing fighter designs
• major redesign of the Coalition systems
• new ship(s) (dunno yet)
• changes to the launcher design and content (display of dynamic ingame content, news, etc.)
• multiple client side feature additions (details will be discussed later)
• bug fixes (if reported to the ticketsystem)
• another try to improve the Sol transport mission
• new info box and new save point when leaving main mission to start the bonus missions (just in case players run into problems and have to return to this point)
• it was planed to allow clans to increase their territory... which still is something we need to figure out how to do that.
• changes were planed to be done to fighter turrets
• improvements to clan base defense turrets
• yet again a try to fix the docking of the armored transport
• new effects for dynamic universe events
• including a backup and cleanup system for server error logs (because this caused major issues twice this year)

The list is not complete yet but as you can see it is going to be a large update.

The modeling work seems to be mostly done. Only a few cockpits need some texture work (which I will do later).

My intention is to start putting all the stuff that I have prepared so far together now.... which means starting next week actually.

It is still much work to be done but the progress should be much faster from now on.

I absolutely like the new windows despite a few minor issues (certain 3d hooks can not find entry points but i am sure that is going to be fixed soon and for some reason the bright design wont open the start menu which is ok since I use dark anyways)

I wish there were some more transparency settings.

Everything feels very fast and fluent and unlike win 10 the new style seems to get applied everywhere. Double settings got removed and everything looks much more clean.

I have investigated the light issues and flickering textures which are caused by a change of DirectX and am at the point to make a decision how to deal with the issue.

The proposal to edit the lights of the game and turn spot lights into point lights is working but a very invasive method causing different lighting due to the different nature of the light types. I don't really like that.

I've spend a few weeks testing stuff, trying different wrappers and settings and meanwhile I am at the point where I think a more differentiated approach might be the better solution.

Fact is this is a Windows 10 and Windows 11 issue (potentially also windows 7 but I could not verify that) because it is directly related to changes in DirectX12.

The shaders we have are almost all compatible down to Windows XP, while WinXP clearly does not suffer these lighting issues.

The issue also happens on the vanilla FL shader option. However, here I found a working solution that prevents the lighting issues completely.

With other words. Vanilla FL can be fixed, the enb aswell as the sfx shader options remain working on WinXP and potentially also Win7.

A solution for Windows 10 and 11 would be to use a specific dx wrapper in combination with a Dx10/11 shader version similar to the one we already have.

Tests showed that this is working. Multiple presets for the new windows versions can be created.

Best case would be to have a new structure on the launcher with Vanilla FL on top followed by a single DX10/11 version and then followed by the already existing old versions which remain compatible with WinXP.

That "single DX10/11" however might be a problem. I know how to create multiple presets that you can switch on the fly in the game but I don't know yet how to store the selection yet. Work in progress. Need to ask Huor if he has an idea.

One this issue is resolved I can roll out an update very soon.

Thanks to Huor the remaining problems with the shader update and lighting fix were resolved yesterday... at least in a test environment.

I am trying to put everything together now to be compatible with the current CF build so that a release of this can be done maybe tomorrow or friday.

What exactly will change?

The lighting bugs on Windows 10 and Windows 11 will be totally fixed on the Vanilla FL shader option.

The existing enb and RS+SFX shader options will be relabeled to be legacy options. They won't be removed and remain usable for for people which for whatever reason still use Windows XP or Vista.

All other players with Windows 7, 8, 10 and 11 actually have access to DirectX 10 or higher. I believe even on Windows 7 DX12 can be used.

For these players only ONE shader option will be recommended on the launcher next to Vanilla FL (for those who are resistent to better graphics).

This option comes with several presets. Inside the game you can use F12 has hotkey to enable/disable the effects and switch between the presets using F10 and F11. The game will remember the last selected preset.

You also will be able to edit these presets inside the game with hundreds of options and you will be able to create your own presets.

If you think you have created something totally awesome looking you can share your preset here on the forum and maybe if it is really a good addition I might add it as an official preset to the game updates.

That being said I think we need to discuss the state of the blackstar fleet update in general.

I announced it the first time somewhen in 2020 and we are approaching 2022 in a few weeks without this update being released.

Yesterday I discussed this topic with Huor and I actually feel terrible about it. It is no secret that I never released a CF update in time. It still bothers me despite the fact that I released multiple smaller updates inbetween.

The battleship rebalancing we did earlier this year and now this lighting fix/shader update actually were meant to be part of the blackstar fleet update. But still, it is not what I have announced.

Sure I have shared the stuff I have been working on here on this thread and also on my gallery or on discord. It is not that there has not been much progress but over time the ambitions for this update grew significantly larger. The motivation to keep pushing the work unfortunately was not constant and I personally jumped from starting one new idea... then moved to the next... and then the next... jumped back and forth trying to get at least a bit work done.

In the end I started many different things without really bringing that stuff to an end.

Yesterday I said to Huor that I have to admit that I lost track of many things I wanted to do. I have to get stuff organized again... I have to put stuff that I have started to work on together... either getting it finished as a step towards the release of the intended Blackstar fleet update or getting it released early in order to get my to-do list smaller.

Huor offered to help with some stuff yesterday which is highly appreciated, not only because of the help itself but also because of the motivational factor that is related with having team working together on a project.

I hope to get a better structure in the work process now... getting the needed motivation to tackle down the remaining problems and finish the stuff that I started but never really finished.

If Blackstar Fleet will be released as a big update similar the size between CF1.9 and CF2.0 remains to be seen. Maybe I will split it and release it in junks if this is beneficial to the workflow. I don't know yet.

the shader update/lighting fix for CF is now available

a short showcase how to edit and create new presets

It certainly requires a bit more time to play with the effects and getting the fine tuning right to create something better looking but this is actually just meant to show how stuff works.

You can also edit the existing presets if you don't like the lens effects or the bloom. Just disable the individual effects.

If you think you messed up one of the presets you can just delete it and the launcher will fetch the original from the server again.

I did a small update of the shader options, introducing "Vanilla FL (Legacy)" which improves compatibility with older windows versions.

also some experimental work

Sovjestkaya old version:

sovjetskayaold.jpg

Sovjestkaya new version:

sovjetskayanew.jpg