Design Tool-Ship Maker

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lordxorn
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Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by lordxorn »

I just wanted to share this with my fellow modders. Doing research for some mod ideas I have, I happened upon a community that can work hand in hand with us DW modders.

Maybe some of you heard of it before, but it is a freeware tactical spaceship game called Battleships Forever!. IT is actually a decent game, that had HUGE potential. There was even talk of multiplayer, but the small dev team came to an impass. Once the coder stopped getting along with the graphics guy, the whole thing imploded and now the forums are kind of a barren wasteland. Sadly some of the original mod links have been broken as well.

The good thing for us is that the game itself comes with a modular type of Ship Maker program that works perfectly for us modders here in the DW forums because the perspective is top down as well.

Now don't be turned off by the line graphics of the original game, they were in the process of upgrading them to fully colored and partially shaded pieces.

So if you is so inclined to look into it, check out the forums and check the stuff made by Kaelin who was one of the original artist. His SW stuff is good and plentiful. It is kind of a pain to get to know how Ship Maker works and how to add the new sprites, so if you need help just reply here.

I put together the following ship in 10mins flat. So I will be messing around with it some more, and see what I can do.

Image
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J HG T
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by J HG T »

Yep, played it for a while couple of years ago. Fun little game and ship-editor was easy to use and extremely fun to play with. I actually designed some ships for a race that I came up with while messing with the editor. Have to see if those would be any use now.
Nothing is impossible, not if you can imagine it!
"And they hurled themselves into the void of space with no fear."
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Igard
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by Igard »

Sounds really cool, lordxorn. Thanks.

Though I can't get the image to load just now. It loads the top fine, but then it's done. Perhaps the servers full. I'll try later. [8D]
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WoodMan
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by WoodMan »

Nice find Xorn!

For some reason your picture isn't showing though [:(]
"My body may be confined to this chair, but my mind is free to explore the universe" - Stephen Hawking
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lordxorn
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by lordxorn »

Thanks guys, yeah my upload failed when I went to the gym. Resizing and fixing now.

Yeah J HG T, I remember hearing about it a year ago but never went back. Now I am regretting not being involved, and too bad it wasn't developed further.

OFF SUBJECT WARNING!
OMG Minecraft had a new update, time for some Minecraft!! lol
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J HG T
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by J HG T »

OFF-TOPIC:
Shame on me. Haven't played Minecract for weeks. DW has taken all my PC-gaming time, be it a good or bad thing.
Nothing is impossible, not if you can imagine it!
"And they hurled themselves into the void of space with no fear."
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WoodMan
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by WoodMan »

This is the kind of thing some of you guys might be interested in, I don't have a link but there is a vid on youtube, this guy created a 1:1 scale of the Enterprise in Minecraft, its pretty amazing!
"My body may be confined to this chair, but my mind is free to explore the universe" - Stephen Hawking
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J HG T
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by J HG T »

Kinda old in my books but still shows what Minecraft is capable of. Minecraft is Legos for gamers. So much fun and genius.
Nothing is impossible, not if you can imagine it!
"And they hurled themselves into the void of space with no fear."
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2guncohen
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by 2guncohen »

I stumbled on Battleships Forever! some days ago when looking for new stuff for wing commander.
And then this caught my eye [&o] Doest it not look marvelous ?


Image

Iff someone can provide me a good free-wear soft to remove background.
Then I would realy love to try to get this art in distant worlds.


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lordxorn
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by lordxorn »

2guncohen,

Is that a shipset from Battleships Forever? If it is whose is it, and if not where is it from?

They look great, and looks like the originator put some nice after touch effects that Ship Maker does not provide.

Like the light effects coming out of the hangars, looks really cool.
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lordxorn
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by lordxorn »

ORIGINAL: J HG T

Kinda old in my books but still shows what Minecraft is capable of. Minecraft is Legos for gamers. So much fun and genius.

Well Minecraft is not old, because is just entered Beta a couple weeks ago. I think it is more fair to say that the graphics are "Old School", but like you say about the gameplay "It is a Gamer's Lego Dream Come True", mixed in with very Light Role Playing elements without a story.

If you haven't played Minecraft since Infdev, or the Creative only it has come a LONGGG way. Not to mention many HD 128bit texture packs, and Mods that introduce more RPG play elements.


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2guncohen
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by 2guncohen »

ORIGINAL: lordxorn

2guncohen,

Is that a shipset from Battleships Forever? If it is whose is it, and if not where is it from?

They look great, and looks like the originator put some nice after touch effects that Ship Maker does not provide.

Like the light effects coming out of the hangars, looks really cool.

The artists name is IND1GOblue he has Battleships Forever stuff in the BF-Forum.
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lordxorn
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by lordxorn »

2Guncohen,

Ok friend your wish is my command, I have done the easy part, now you have to touch them up and make them DW ready. [:D]

IND1GOblue of Deviant Art is the artist.

Capital Ship
Image

Carrier
Image

Cruiser
Image
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Igard
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by Igard »

ORIGINAL: 2guncohen

Iff someone can provide me a good free-wear soft to remove background.
Then I would realy love to try to get this art in distant worlds.

You can download either paint.NET or GIMP to get these images ready for DW. Both are free. [:)]

Add an Alpha channel to the image and then start removing the background. Just ask if you need any help. [;)]

This looks really cool.
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WoodMan
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by WoodMan »

Attempted, seems I made the Cap image too small (althought it is 300x300)



Image
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GunCohenShips.jpg
GunCohenShips.jpg (96.93 KiB) Viewed 306 times
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lordxorn
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by lordxorn »

The carrier looks great ingame.

What is the hull size? 1100?

If it is 1100, try just updating the cap to 500x and let's see if it retains more detail.
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WoodMan
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by WoodMan »

I'm not sure, its at tech level 5, I think because the game renders slim ships longer, the Cap really probably does need a bigger image, usually 300 is okay for the stubby shaped ships I normally work on [:D]

I was able to bring it up to 370x370, any more and it would start to lose detail. To get it any bigger I'd have to start with the original and clean it up again. Added sharpening and noise reduction to compensate for enlarge. Testing now.

Image
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GunCap.jpg
GunCap.jpg (36.06 KiB) Viewed 300 times
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WoodMan
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by WoodMan »

Still a bit blurry, even though as you can see the ingame image is smaller than the actual image, so I got a feeling its more to do with the shape [&:]

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WoodMan
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by WoodMan »

Okay, I got to go to bed, 2am [>:]

Here is a zip of the png files in their current state, I forgot to redo the engine trail and running lights after the resize on the Cap. If you can do that and repost them they should work okay. [:)] Or have a go at making a 500x500 Cap, I'll test it tomorrow. night dude!



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family1.zip
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James009
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RE: Design Tool-Ship Maker

Post by James009 »

This is great! I'm going to test this out tomorrow. Thanks for posting it.
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