Posts by Bullwinkle

Quote from uncleglennie

By fighting those hostile aliens you really start to figure out their tactics pretty well.

Exactly.

One "habit" of the NPC's is that they alter their tactics depending on your distance from them. At short to medium range, the enemy that you target evades, while the others will follow you.

At longer range (more than 1000 units, but can be farther), they re-form a "wing" and head straight at you. This is scary because 4 enemies firing simultaneously deliver a lot of firepower per second, so you have to be careful to turn when your shields collapse. Ideally you should turn just before your shields collapse, in order to avoid the several seconds that it takes your shields to restart from zero.

The good news is that the enemies are very easy to target when they are flying straight toward you. If you have longer-range weapons than they have, then you can do a lot of damage before their weapons reach optimal range.

Quote from Hellraiser

Many people don't know hot to destroy trojans.
How do u do that?

Run a virus scanner in Safe Mode. That will clean up most things, including most stubborn malicious software.

You do not necessarily need to have your A/V Auto-Protect running all of the time. Just scan once in a while.

Rootkits can be more difficult. Fortunately, they are also more rare.

Quote from Huor

every government on this world is hiding truth - just as no one needs to know everything. And thats good. Power makes corrupt, money too... And actually one of both is valid for many government members.

While I agree with what you say, Huor, the movie is about international groups that are more powerful than governments. It is impossible to know for sure, but the theories make sense, based on human nature, and they are more than a little bit frightening. The current global recession and contests/wars over oil benefit a few small, elite, groups of people -- and it is not at all difficult to imagine that those people have powerful leverage over the governments of the world.

The movie is targeted toward an American audience, but it has little to do with America. The hypothetical power groups are international, and more likely centered in Europe, rather than in America. The Freemasons and Illuminati are much older than than the USA.

Quote from Huor

is there an abstract?

Think of this movie as a semi-funny satire on world politics. There are some partial truths, and there are some wild leaps that defy logic. It is a mix of sensationalism and reality, and is an extension of some of the thoughts presented in The Da Vinci Code and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider.

The main premise is that there are secret societies, made up of some of the world's most powerful and influential people, who "control" (or influence) governments and economies as they see fit. Nobody votes for them, there is no way for an individual to be "heard" by them, and they answer to no authority other than themselves. Some of the alleged groups are:

- The Bilderberg Group
- Freemasons
- The Illuminati
- Knights Templar (and the heads of the Catholic Church)
- Skull and Bones Society
- Trilateral Commission
- Council on Foreign Relations (CFR)

The Bilderbergs and Freemasons originated in Europe. Skull and Bones is thought to have originated at Yale University, but it is clearly influenced by (and, probably, populated by) historical and family connections to a European base. The Trilateral Commission and the CFR were founded by David Rockefeller, grandson of John D. Rockefeller, the founder of Standard Oil and the guy who made drilling for petroleum one of the largest businesses on Earth.

Is it possible that there may be "secret societies" with the power to influence the global economy and major government decisions? Of course.

It is probable? I think, "yes", given what I know about people. Of course, that is just a guess.

Regarding the details, you should know that the guy who made the movie, Michael Moody, is a Mormon who makes movies about UFOs (and other sensationalistic crap). The Mormon Church is an artificial semi-religion that is loosely based on Judeo-Christianity with some absolute nonsense thrown in by the founder, Joseph Smith. The Mormon "Church of Christ of Latter-Day Saints" was founded less than 200 year ago so that they could claim their own state -- Utah. It is more like an overgrown cult than a real religion, but they have a lot of power and money, and that is more important than logic, apparently.

Moody is also somewhat ignorant. Here is an excerpt from Moody's MySpace site:

College is pathetic and never should exist. I learned everything I needed to know by the time I graduated the 8th grade so why waste another 15 years of our lives with this bullshit?

At one point in the movie, Moody spends several minutes making a bizarre argument that compares birth certificates to berths and their role in Maritime Law. Although "birth" and "berth" are pronounced the same, they are entirely different words, with different roots.

And UFOs... well, there may very well be a few flying around, but most of the discussion about them is fake.

If you don't believe me, then ask Awesomeman what is REALLY going on at the US Air Force Stargate facility in Cheyenne Mountain. But don't be surprised if he refuses to admit to anything. If he knows, it is probably Classified, and he cannot talk about it.

(just kidding, Awesomeman!)

Here is some more background on the Mormon Church. The funniest part is that it is all 100% accurate. The SouthPark people did not have to exaggerate in order to make fun of the Mormons:

[video]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHdeR5QKvWU

Quote from SWAT_OP-R8R

what a stupid shit

Here is my favorite part:

Quote from SWAT_OP-R8R

only once every 3600 years close to the sun -> that are 3599 years without sunlight -> thats friggin cold

Yeah, I imagine that they would have to stay indoors most of their "year".

It is hard to tell about breathing frozen gases... there are bacteria in caves that never see sunlight. They get their energy from eating rocks. So maybe the aliens eat their air?

But one thing is for sure... if the gravity of the planet is greater than Jupiter, then the aliens probably all are "overweight". Maybe Jabba the Hut's home world?

Quote from SWAT_OP-R8R

and stupid ones coz every 3600 years they miss their chance to settle on earth

Some days I cannot tell whether that is smart or stupid.

I am sorry to hear that you are still having trouble with the Inner Core aliens, uncleglennie. They are hard, for sure, but definitely not impossible.

Here is my favorite method for handling them:

Space Jousting

The main idea is to stay out of range of their weapons by using longer-range weapons (DKAs) on your own ship.

The encounter becomes quite a bit easier after you have picked off one or two of them.

("no offense [intended]" is an idiomatic expression that means approximately the same as "just kidding". )

My mother handles a gun better than those chicks.

(Although she is probably past her prime years for Maxim)

(no offense, Mom!)

http://splashpage.mtv.com/2009…ction-cowboy-bebop-movie/

I think they picked Keanu Reeves because he looks so much like Spike Speigel:

Quote from Michael

lol but the second video is just a fan made video with matrix and some other movies. Still, a movie from that would be cool

Whoops... I was fooled by the title! There does appear to be a movie planned for 2011, with Keanu Reeves as Spike Speigel, but there is not much more information available yet.

Quote from Destroying Angel

if there was ONE film/series that would deserve having it's space fighters and ships made real in freelancer it would be Cowboy Bebop! The series is practically BASED on FL if not the other way round (it's an oldish Animation)

I had to look up Cowboy Bebop (1998), and I agree that it is probably influenced by Privateer and also probably influenced Starlancer and Freelancer. Cowboy Bebop has gate accidents (like the Houston Debris Field), people living in junk fields (like Junkers), and people hacking gate lanes (like Lane Hackers). And, of course, the crew of the Bebop are all Bounty Hunters. As you say, Cowboy Bebop has quite a bit in common with Freelancer.

I would love to hear some of the excellent Cowboy Bebop music in-game, as well!

[video]

I see that there is a hollywood version of the movie scheduled for release in 2011:

[video]

Quote from Michael

Not really, the ones OP posted some have more graphics but harder ship control, or inertia, or inverted drectins with no chance of changing them... etc and makes the game be worse than Freelancer even it would have more graphics.

Yes, that is exactly my point. I have yet to find a space sim with a better balance -- and more fun -- than Freelancer.

And Mass Effect... that isn't even in the same category of "space sim", is it? I thought it was more like Quake and Doom?

Quote from SWAT_OP-R8R

a matter of oppinion

Of course it is subjective, but can you think of a counter-example?

I have been looking for a new game for a long time, and have not yet found anything better than Freelancer. i would love to hear a good suggestion!

Quote from Destroying Angel

Asked my programmer friend about helping with modding FL and he plainly said he would rather spend his time making a mod for a game that WASN'T made before 2005 lol!

You could point out to him that the Freelancer engine is the best space sim engine ever made. The fact that it is seven years old is not nearly as important as the fact that there is no better game to mod.

No problem, Pakundo.

It sounds as though you knew the answers before you asked, but good luck in your efforts!

Quote from Pakundo

4. + 5. ... in each copy there would be values he found best for each resolution

6. I know, I know.

Fonts are highly subjective, and vary with the typeface. You could find what you like best, but another person might not like your choices.

So it sounds as though you are all set then, right?

Quote from Pakundo

I know how to make a screen shot...
someone with a screen res of 1920x1200 ...

You originally asked about 1280 x 720 resolution (16:9). Obviously, 1920 x 1200 (16:10) is different. Both fovx and font sizes will be different between those two resolutions.

If you know how to post a screenshot, then why don't you do it, instead of asking half-questions without giving us enough information to understand what you want to do?

The difficulty with making a mod for fonts.ini -- or even listing "good" font sizes -- is that they vary by screen resolution, font typeface, and user preference. There is no "right" way that will work for everyone, and the variety of screen shapes and sizes makes it nearly impossible to handle all possible combinations.

At 1920 x 1200, the fonts listed in the moddb tutorial should be pretty close. They were intentionally chosen on the small side in order to accommodate even larger screen resolutions.

There are not that many fonts to change... to scale them all by 10-30% takes only a minute or two. You can make the process even quicker by experimenting with one font first in order to figure out a "scale factor" that you like, then do the others.

Skip the crazy six-digit precision... two digits to the right of the decimal is usually enough... three digits for fine-tuning.

Quote from Pakundo

In Freelancer, does changing font size causes a change in menu size? both main menu and in-game, neither, none or one of them?

No, the font size only changes the size of the fonts. The menus remain the same. In fact, none of the INI files changes the size of the menus (hex edits can change the menu size, but the Crossfire launcher will overwrite your changed files).

Changing your screen resolution will make the menus appear to be "smaller" in relation to the screen, but that is only because your screen is larger. The menus themselves remain the same.

A screenshot of what you are looking at would help us to help you. Press "PrtScrn", then attach the image to your message. Look in My Documents for the screen shot.

Quote from Pakundo

What about the positioning of menus?
Can they be changed?

What menus are you asking about?

Quote from Michael

Well, al solved then

Just replace that data and you don't have to worry about it anymore.

Right. Changing the fovx values fixes everything except for the HUD window locations.