Bring it to life - Mechcommander 2 Campaing

rollin

EDIT: RELEASED!!

Download here

http://www.moddb.com/mods/dark-gray-borderworlds


So after more then half a year this project is now close enough to the finish line that I can post the first bits of information.
I'll update this thread whenever I have some news.

Are there some polycount MechCommander fans except me?.

More or less this is an campaign for wolfman's updated version of the mc2 source code game version. MC2X

• But it will feature new building graphics (I'm still a 3d artist and not so much a mapper )
• I want to push the MC2 map visual quality to the limit with these maps.
• Also I'm adding tiny bits of improvements like dropping some of the less useful team colors and replacing them with more fitting ones.
• And I've changed the font size of the mission objectives to be better readable on higher resolutions.

The "Rollin's Rocker" Logo is made by zealotdesign

GarageBay9

I suddenly feel the urgent need to voice-key a fusion reactor and kill some freebirths.

Glad to see somebody is still giving that game some love, and I really like these building designs. They fit the old BattleTech art design very well. Earl Geier and Alan Nunis would be proud.

Cap Hotkill

Looks good!

Its funny but MechWarrior 2 Mercenaries had even Lower poly buildings and Lower res textures :P

Szark

Huge fan of the original MechCommander here! Never got into the second one though!

Lookin' good so far, keep it up!

Der Hollander

I dig it. I haven't gotten to MechCommander 2 yet, but it's on my list. Anything from the Battletech universe is on my like list, and these are some sweet buildings. Plus a snow level? Awesome.

GarageBay9

Cap Hotkill wrote: »

Looks good!

Its funny but MechWarrior 2 Mercenaries had even Lower poly buildings and Lower res textures :P

The weird thing is, if you go back and look at the art direction and modeling style for the Mech2 games, the stuff was so low poly, and the colors were such a mix of drab manmade objects in vivid environments, that the whole thing took on almost kind of an impressionistic or minimalist feel. The visuals were extremely powerful and immersive, especially the landscapes - remember Twycross, Prosperina, Macduff, New Ivarseen, Arc Royal and Wotan?

I know people here will look at me like I'm growing a foot out of my forehead, but pound for pound, I honestly still believe the Mech2 series are some of the most beautiful games ever. Some part of the soul and the raw visual power was lost when they started trying to make the visuals photo-realistic... Mech 3 was impressive but it just wasn't the same, and Mech 4 was honestly a step backwards in some places.

rollin

It's the old fight - style against foto realism. I'm really waiting for more mw5 footage.. I liked mw4 a lot but somehow mw3 wasn't that impressive.. I guess the audio of mw2 was one of the big reasons why this game is and was so awesome.

And if there is some developer out there wanting to make mechcommander 3.. TAKE ME!!!

ok enough advertisement..


thx for your replies!
Here are now all the buildings I've done.

and yes.. there is a snow level

Zack Fowler

make "I am a fan of Rollin" t-shirts and I will buy one

edit: or Rollin's Rockers, that would work better even?

rollin

t-shirts would be cool indeed


ok with many different projects atm I do my best to push this to the finish line

I've made some source code changes (simple stuff.. just some first steps with c++)

a message box system to allow some 'story' ingame without the need of talented voice actors

here is an screen of the 4th map start position

atm I'm writing story text stuff.
Also 2 of 4 maps are already finished

And I'm on moddb now

rollin

muhahaha.. what a misinterpretation of the time frame.. now 3 years are gone but now I really release it!

Here you go. Everything is up on the moddb page

http://www.moddb.com/mods/dark-gray-borderworlds/news/first-release17

It's free and you don't need MC2 original as the source code was released. You don't even have to install it: Just unpack the zip (maybe you have to install the c++ runtime lib if you don't have it already)

Feels quite good to finally get this out of the door. I don't know how many hours I spend on tweaking the 5 missions until they worked well and nothing was blocking the mission. (mc2 you are soooooo arrrrrrrrr)

If there are some fans of MC2 here this is for sure worth a look. They are difficult but imo not as unfair as MC2 was some times.
Play on regular difficulty if you are back after a long time. I tested on veteran. The hardest difficulty level should be possible too.

There are no custom mechs in this first release as there are still some animations missing and I was focusing on the campaign.

And important about quicksave:
qucksave often but quickload rarely! There are a few bugs connected with quickloading which are in some maps more obvious (ice map) then in others (last one). Most noticeable the scripted ai-path can get corrupt. This can lead to ai units standing bit confused around and making the whole gameplay easier then intended. So I've your able try plying without quickload to get the real impression of action going on!

cheers!!