Question about Close Combat.

[RyanCrierie]

Question for Matrix/CSO/Whoever.

Once you've finished remaking the Close Combat series so they'll run on modern computers; what's your plan for the future of Close Combat?

I mean, I like all the mods available for Close Combat 3; like Finnmod, Western Front Mod, Commonwealth Summer, Real Romanians, WWI mod, etc; but I would love it if it was possible to have a single merged "unified" close combat game engine that could handle everything; without having to swap mods.

[sabre1]

+1, fantastic idea RyanCrierie!

[sabre1]

Doggie, you of all people a "Matrix Legion of Honor" forum member not knowing what COTA means.

I'm gonna have to take your picture down off my wall.

[Andrew Williams]

Close Combat mods

http://closecombat.matrixgames.com/

You can play Classic CC4 and CC5 in tLD  (there are a few more in process of conversion GJS, Blooduy Omaha, Red Storm Rising, Meuse Crssing etc)

There is a bunch of mods (15 or so for CoI)  Western Front and Commonwealth summer are stand outs.

CCMT has  cc2Redux and CC5in CCMT as well as a few mini mods.

WaR has ABTF and vetBOB

You don't play over the same maps in CoI...

Each operation moves on to a different set of maps.

[RyanCrierie]

To elaborate further:

Right now, it appears the CC3 file format is:

Vehicles.txt which is a tab-separated file format which can be read by excel; all good so far.

BUT

the graphics are locked away in

Tanks.zfx

Which are a proprietary format.

What I'd like to see is something like this:

M4A1 Sherman.veh

Veh is in reality a renamed ZIP file (the patents on LZW encoding have expired so it's public domain now).

And they contain

M4A1 Sherman.csv <--data files for the vehicle set up in CSV format like so:

Front Armor, 21;
Rear Armor, 15;

So you can easily edit them.

Plus

M4A1 Sherman_Turret.png
M4A1 Sherman_Hull.png

Basically self explanatory; a set of PNG files with alpha channels that get read by the game engine.

You'd basically be able to add tanks easily to the game by simply dragging .veh files from a mod pack into your CCx\Vehicle folder; without having to edit files like Vehicles.txt or Tanks.zfx

[Andrew Williams]

Just get gadgetmunger to open the zfx files

the tga's&nbsp; can then be edited with any graphics program.

then rebuilt with gadgetmunger

three clicks and you're done&nbsp; (apart from the graphics work)

[GoodGuy]

ORIGINAL: Doggie

ORIGINAL: GoodGuy



While COTA simulates operational warfare, not tactical (small) engagements, facing a human opponent on COTA is as thrilling as on CC....

What the hell is "COTA"?

I hate it when I got to try and figure out what initials stand for.

Sorry.[:)]

Conquest of the Aegean, like Slick stated.
COTA along with HttR (Highway to the Reich), and the upcoming BFTB (Battle for the Bulge) feature the best engines for simulating operational warfare on the market. They are all from Panther Games.

To be honest, I was puzzled yesterday when someone mentioned the games CC:OG (or something like that) and FoF in another thread, and I was like "what the heck is that?", too....

Can anyone enlighten me what these abbr. stand for?

[06 Maestro]

ORIGINAL: GoodGuy

To be honest, I was puzzled yesterday when someone mentioned the games CC:OG (or something like that) and FoF in another thread, and I was like "what the heck is that?", too....
Can anyone enlighten me what these abbr. stand for?

CoG EE is Crown of Glory, Emperors Edition.
FoF is Forge of Freedom.

Both are by by WCS. The outstanding feature of those games is the ability to play a strategic level game and zoom in to fight a large battle at division or brigade level. Those are also WEGO type games with individual game files merged into one for execution.

[NefariousKoel]

ORIGINAL: SLAAKMAN

NK-

Shouldn't you be walking around wearing a breadboard that says "The End Is Nigh! Find God or Die!" on a street somewhere instead of championing your pet CC3 maps?

ALL MAPS ARE MY PET MAPS YOU MALODEROUS BOOB!! AND I DONT SEE YOU ON THE BATTLEFIELD YET BOZO SO GET YOUR BLATHERING BUTT OFF THE POT AND PICK UP THAT WEAPON BEFORE I BAR-BQ YOUR REPUGNANT AZZ!!!

If it has the Men In Black, Satan, and your much maligned Commufeminazis available for force purchases, then perhaps I would subject myself to that annoyingly buggy series. Just to witness your heart exploding.

[SLAAKMAN]

NeuteredKripple-

If it has the Men In Black, Satan, and your much maligned Commufeminazis available for force purchases, then perhaps I would subject myself to that annoyingly buggy series. Just to witness your heart exploding.

"Oh dear Lord Jesus, this ain't happening man. This can't be happening man! This isn't happening!" [:'(]

http://www.moviesoundclips.net/movies1/aliens/cant.mp3

[RyanCrierie]

Just get gadgetmunger to open the zfx files

the tga's can then be edited with any graphics program.

then rebuilt with gadgetmunger

That works for the present Close Combat games; but is a tad inefficient; I can edit SHP files for the various steel panthers games with Fred Chlanda's SHPEdit , but if I was starting work on a Next Generation Steel Panthers or Close Combat; I would make it so that you didn't need special tools to access the file formats, other than common graphics programs or office suites.

[Andrew Williams]

I'll tell you what is inefficient.

Reprogramming a whole game so you can more easily import a graphic you have made.


Sorry... close combat is moddable as it is, with a few simple tools, mostly Exel and notepad for all the data files and a paint program for maps and graphics including UI, rewriting the code base to facilitate a very small minority of users is neither time,cost or any other effective.


Now, if you were talking about starting with a clean slate and a new game was in development I would agree 110% with you.


EDIT: Most of (All?) the recent releases have excel/open office workbooks available for them. This is a much more open system than the previous developers penchant for encoding the files in a proprietary locked format.

[RyanCrierie]

Now, if you were talking about starting with a clean slate and a new game was in development I would agree 110% with you.

Sorry about that. My fault for not making my post a bit clearer.

Yes, I was referring to a clean sheet Close Combat, where you can start afresh and design the game engine and system to be more open from the beginning.

[SLAAKMAN]

Why all the hoopla over new maps, mods, designs, slates & all that balderdash??? None of you can survive the catastrophe of my Berlin Pet maps!!! Take the real test of a Great Warrior & enter my Realm of Dooom!!

[sabre1]

I like that "Commufeminazis", maybe add progressives to the end. [;)]

[Andrew Williams]

if it was possible to have a single merged "unified" close combat game engine that could handle everything; without having to swap mods.

There is no modswapping in tLD and waR

Mods are installed once with bernds mod installer utility and have a desktop icon so that you just Dbl click on the mod/theatre/scenario/settings you want to play.

No waiting for mods to swap in or out.

No chance of corrupted base install.

Just click and play.

It's the easiest and cleanest way to play mods and the stock game since CC was first released.

[Andrew Williams]

I had a plan laid out two years ago that was based around the Ünified" installation theory suggested above.


If you had WaR installed then a new installation of tLD would would install to the same folders and upgrade any earlier installations to the most up to date specs.

At launch you had the option to play, for instance, tLd or WaR, just by clicking on it's icon.

This would continue on with any subsequent game purchases keeping all your CC titles up to date with the latest features.

Of course mods would be similarly accessible and enabled with the new features.

This is a huge advantage to users with all games and mods updated and kept relevant rather than as an archival wonder.

The advantages from the developers perspective is that the technical support tail is shortened with out the developer having multiple different versions of the game engine to expend resources on.


All it takes is a little forethought and planning......

[PoorOldSpike]

ORIGINAL: milkweg
Get a bigger monitor to solve your issue. I just ordered the HansG 28" 1900x1200 from newegg because my eyes have problems with some games too.

Good call, i got a HannsG 28" last week (300 GB pounds/490 US dollars) so i can see the small print, it opens up several games that were too small to see before..

[SLAAKMAN]

Sabre1-

I like that "Commufeminazis", maybe add progressives to the end.

I will annihilate them all!!
&nbsp;

[Andrew Williams]

If the sprites are a bit small for you, you can always lower the screen resolution to "upsize" things.