176 replies to this topic

[Gilrock]

Great work on this table.  I could've sworn there was another thread where someone was saying that the bumpers would regularly bump the ball back into the bonus kicker.  I've never played the game in real life and I only played one game so far in VP, but into the ice cave, the bumpers bumped it back in 3 times in a row.  I'm running 9.9.0 (last official one as far as I know).

Yeah that was my Time Warp table.  It was happening to a couple people but wasn't happening for me so it's one of those things where its hard to know if you've improved it.  Fixing it for one person probably breaks it for another.

[Shoopity]

Its super smooth, even bodyless it looks cool.  I'm going to have to post a pic tonight ...

 

When testing the code, I just had the head... like, a giant head, the size of the entire toy; even bigger than Rudy.  I considered leaving it that way for you guys.

 

Yeah that was my Time Warp table.  It was happening to a couple people but wasn't happening for me so it's one of those things where its hard to know if you've improved it.  Fixing it for one person probably breaks it for another.

 

That's why I couldn't find the post anywhere, I was looking for Frankenstein posts when I should've been looking for Time Warp.  Actually, I watched one video of Frankenstein where it bounced back in 2 times in a row so it's not unheard of.  I have no problem tweaking things myself, I was just sharing the information for the author so he/she can look into and make their own decision.

[dark]

Okay I'm nearing completion on the entire Frank assembly for VP, but I've run into a bit of dilemma.  Frank looks fine in the desktop test table that shoop put together, I took the time to rotate the test table and it made me realize that in the FS version Frank will appear much more top view'ish.  Previous FS version that just made use of ramp images, this wasn't an issue but with a real model it wants to show it more from the top view, I personally don't like it looking this way all that much, I'd like to see him leaned back a bit.

 

There's a few things I can do to compensate for this but I'm not sure which is the best option to make things more convenient all round. 

 

-Instead of stacking the mesh's in an order so that when imported they all sit on top of each other, like the head sits on top of the body which sits inside the jacket etc all at a VP Z height of 0, I export each item so that it's pivot point center will allow a rotation in VP to be leaned back.  This pertains specifically to the head since if you tilt the head back without the pivot in the right height position it will throw off his looking left and right rotation (X axis).  The downside of this is that it would be a pain to adjust all the Z heights of the objects to get them in the right position as well as a separate script would probably need to be made to compensate for the new positioning coordinates for the animation.

 

-The alternative would be to just make another export of the models, which are all tilted back for FS, this would mean you wouldn't have to mess with the Z height to get everything lined up, however it would probably still mean the script would need to be adjusted for animating the head in this new position....I'm not sure since I don't do much for coding.  The other draw back of this is that a separate set of mesh/objs would need to be exported, though that's not the end of the world really.  I think with this method there's a chance the scripting might not need to be changed between desktop and FS versions though I'm not entirely sure.

 

I'm sort of leaning towards the second method because I think it would probably be easier for who  ever is scripting it to work with

[The Loafer]

2nd option seems to be the way to go

[ICPjuggla]

Dark I'm curious to see how it would look without adjusting anything. It doesn't make much sense that it would be wrong. You can always adjust the layback to fit your needs to see more of the side of the model etc.

[dark]

Okay I managed to get the head's pivot point in a good spot where it can be tilted back and still looks right when it turns on the x axis (left and right).  This puts the head below the surface of the table by default and you have to play with the z height value to get it in the right spot.  Despite being the one who made the model, it took me probably half an hour to get everything sized and positioned nicely on the actual table.  I think what I'll do is give shoop or who ever wants to script it the copy of the table I've put together so that they can just copy paste the model to the polished, final edition of the NM FS.   As it is the scripting for the head that shoop did as a test for the rotated desktop version he put together is working for this version as well.  I'm not sure what's happened since shoop started work on it, but it seems to me like there's a few graphical issues with the back ramp at the moment.  One small thing that will need to be adjusted is when the balls are diverted into the hands of Frank, the ball needs to sit lower to actually fit in his hand.  Other than that I don't think it will take too much to get this fully working since after watching videos you can see that the arms barely move when they do they're catapult motion of the ball, it's at the very most a 30 degree (fast) incline action.

 

In this pic I've sized the model to be a bit 'fatter' to compensate for FS Z height distortion and I've leaned the models back from 90 degrees to 105 degrees to make them look less "top down view". 

 

[LoadedWeapon]

looks like you moved the Z scale on the table if you do that it will stretch the table and mess things up really cant go passed 1.2.. thats why the flippers and stuff look so weird.. Frank is looking awesome tho

Edited by LoadedWeapon, 17 August 2014 - 11:22 PM.

[dark]

Dark I'm curious to see how it would look without adjusting anything. It doesn't make much sense that it would be wrong. You can always adjust the layback to fit your needs to see more of the side of the model etc.

In this pic only the head has been rotated back to 90, the rest of the model is still at 105 (just to show you), but you can barely see his eyes because his large brow over shadows it from this point of view.  In the above post I explain that I put in extra effort to make the same model work while being rotated (leaned back).  So if someone prefers it more top down they can easily change it from 105 to 90 and or adjust the lay back as they please.  Point is I want him to look the way he does at 105 degrees on the official release without people having to personally mod it - I think this is more realistic since you don't actually look down like that at the top end of the table.  Also compared with the old 2d image ramp, this is still less 'straight forward'.

looks like you moved the Z scale on the table if you do that it will stretch the table and mess things up really cant go passed 1.2.. thats why the flippers and stuff look so weird.. Frank is looking awesome tho

 

I just rotated shoop's test version using the values that the original FS table used.  It would probably be best if shoop or who ever worked on this in the final non-rotated version to avoid any issues but as far as I know he runs desktop versions and that's why he rotated it.  His head actually turns quite nicely in this.  

Edited by dark, 17 August 2014 - 11:30 PM.

[LoadedWeapon]

I did the original mod and the update is posted on page 2 i think.. but here it is.. looks the same just looks like the Z scale is off..

https://www.dropbox....tein NM_NEW.rar

 Untitled.png   2.73MB   5 downloads

Edited by LoadedWeapon, 17 August 2014 - 11:34 PM.

[dark]

Well if you want to check it out or play with the values here it is:

http://www.mediafire...kmodeladded.rar

 

I'm burned out, going to take the rest of the evening off.

[The Loafer]

It looks fantastic, great job on the entire body. Thanks Dark!

[dark]

Of course I couldn't just put it down, I had to play with it some more, I ended up re-adjusting the backdrop settings to match your FS, and his head turning looks so weird without the layback.  So it's either he's top down view'ish or his head turning looks strange.  I think the range of motion could be limited a bit more maybe.  I'm getting a bit frustrated by it to be honest.  

[ICPjuggla]

Sometimes I find it best to put it down and come back the next day with a fresh head.. :-) lol

[The Loafer]

Take a break! The best thing sometime is to take a step back brother
Ok I swear ICPjuggla and I are not sitting in the same room! Lol

[dark]

Well here's how he looks with the standard FS lay back settings used in the table:

In my opinion...

...It sucks!....and the further I tilt him back the more strange the animation starts to look.  I'm thinking for this to look right it may need to be released as a new mod 'model-mod' with different lay back settings and have the table elements adjusted accordingly, or at the very least a compromise down that route because there's not much I can do to make it look good with the current settings.  

 

I'm not sure how much work it would be to adjust everything to make everything jive with the lay back settings I had initially since I don't really deal with that sort of thing but I can't imagine it being too bad since for the most part the table looks fine.  I've tried a number of different things to make this look good and the more I try the more I'm thinking I had it looking as good as it gets in the first rendition I posted above.

Edited by dark, 18 August 2014 - 12:55 AM.

[dark]

Well this is the same as before, added incline, and z height but it's just lined up better and some minor adjustment to the model placement.  You can bring the z scale value down from 1.2 to 1 as it is in the original NM, but that makes the wire rings and wire reflection flashers out of place a fair bit, as it is now (at 1.2) the rings still line up but the flashers are off a bit.  This is a compromise of inclination and the model being tilted by 15 degrees (105 instead of 90).  I think this is about as good as it gets for making the model look good, the ball still lines up with all the ramps but things would need to be adjusted to fix some minor 'cosmetic issues'.

 

http://www.mediafire...modeladded2.rar

[ICPjuggla]

here you go dark, looks much better with different layback settings. Frank looks amazing awesome job man :-)

 

 Frank(layback).png   3.01MB   3 downloads  settings.png   6.22KB   3 downloads

 

 

[LoadedWeapon]

Thanks for all your work dark i will check it out and see what i can do..

[dark]

I updated the model a bit in this version, I noticed the collar on his jacket goes higher, and changed the sizing on the head slightly.

 

ICP's layback settings do less harm to the upper ramp it seems so maybe change to his settings.

 

Any ways, just the model updated in this, shouldn't be much more changes to the model from here:

http://www.mediafire...modeladded2.rar

Edited by dark, 18 August 2014 - 03:17 AM.

[The Loafer]

here is a different take on layback.  I will try your new version in a sec

 

 

Attached Files

•  frank settings.jpg   16.34KB   2 downloads
•  frank2.jpg   246.22KB   2 downloads

Edited by The Loafer, 18 August 2014 - 04:10 AM.