[GFX] [MOD] Shield Hit Effect revision MK2 with overglow 512x512

[eRe4s3r]

Ok, this has its own topic because its a different idea and effect level.

This does make the animated effect itself larger (512x512 instead of 256x256) adds an extremely nice looking nearly dynamic overglow. Which i can sadly not show on screenshots that well (its an volley effect that swells up and swells down) its VERY subtle and VERY not in your face on single or 1-40 hits

The "hit" hotspot is about the same size (differently animated) than the green swirls from before but now added (in the extra pixels ,p) is an overglow that is subtle but gets stronger the more ships shoot the same place, this adds an entire new graphical level to the effect. It also thus makes the "hit" effect much less all overglowing

Please test it and don't judge just by the screenshot ;P



This is internally V6 so don't wonder where the file name comes from

Same place as the other
Copy the PNG files to
AIWar\RuntimeData\Images\Shield

Note that due to the increased sprite size the effect does actually get smaller compared to my previous V1 to V3 in my other topic.

[Echo35]

Shiny! Must install...

[eRe4s3r]

I plan to do the overglow effect for all the effects (particularly explosions) subtle but there - it really adds a LOT to the visual look of the game...

Anyhow, i hope i get some vigilant testers for this one that tell me what sucks and if its too strong or too weak or what Anyhow, i plan to do more effects at some point...

[Red Spot]

mmmh, perhaps I shall just give this a try ... 
 

[x4000]

Wow, nice!  I'm including these in the next version, I think these are definitely better.

[Red Spot]

That would works as well 

[eRe4s3r]

Well as a little sneak preview heres also the "hull being hit" (or basically, shot hits ship) effect - this time its actually "fainter" than the default one but has the same overglow ability as the shield effect, you will not see this all that much when only bunch of ships shoot each other randomly. And its supposed to work with explosions that have glow (hence its much fainter)

Currently redoing the explosions Large and Large2 with glow (together with the hit effect that ought to look pretty nifty)

Sadly no screenshot as i couldn't manage to actually make a decent screenshot of this in action. Effect is very short and the glow pulsates so hopefully you won't see "large nuclear overglows" all that often. But the explosions are gonna be beefed up with glow too.

Though you will see noticeable glow if more than 300 ships shoot on 1 thing ;p

pngs in the attachment here go to
E:\AIWar\RuntimeData\Images\Explosion\Small

Would have large and large 2 done as well but it turned out to pretty difficult to make a 32 frame animation, must be the moon or something.

Anyhow, once its all done i will make a post showing it off properly, so far its trial run for people who are curious...

[x4000]

Sounds good!

[eRe4s3r]

Well i haz completed my little modding project ;P

Turns out it was more work than anticipated... Now the game looks sufficiently "glowy" for my tastes. Now i can finally play AI War with all the addons properly!

* eRe4s3r mentions that its a curse to be an artist and play games, you see stuff you want to change, then you go change it (if its possible), and 4 hours later you changed everything ye wanted to change.

Side note: Kudos for the grenade explosion effect, to recreate that outside of particle illusion i'd have to spend an hour on particle settings and animating stuff and its really nice. ;P

Theres 1 thing left bugging me though - its the missile trails - even after turning the "Damage smoke" even more transparent it does not work as i had hoped.

I don't know if its possible but i'd strongly suggest to have missiles SPAWN particles with random rotation that *stay* in place and fade out over the course of like 20 frames. (That is, not a sprite based fadeout but a opacity based one - just decrease opacity 5% each frame and blend it normally below the other effects.

This is to fix the "super bright/Large" missiles which look pretty weird in close zoom.

[x4000]

Nice!  Unfortunately, for the missile trails those are something that I prerender only for reasons of RAM use, which is pretty important here.

[eRe4s3r]

I suspected as much - with that many missiles flying around i can imagine that having states on particles for each of them that you have go through each frame for EACH particle is going to be a major issue... ah well.

One can't have everything By the way thanks for your mention of me on the front-page ,) It certainly helps my ego 

Now to play AI War, FINALLY ;P 

[x4000]

I suspected as much - with that many missiles flying around i can imagine that having states on particles for each of them that you have go through each frame for EACH particle is going to be a major issue... ah well.

Yeah, I sort of tried that in the past (well, different particles, though not independently animated), and it's just way too much.  Would look very cool in a game with less going on, though.  I'm looking forward to AVWW because we can cram a lot of stuff onto the screen in that sort of fashion, given that there will be a lot less in memory at any given time (though the procedural world will be even larger than AI War, most of it will be sitting idle on the player disk at any given time).

By the way thanks for your mention of me on the front-page ,) It certainly helps my ego 

Of course!  Thanks for the new art.

Now to play AI War, FINALLY ;P