A question regarding the floor tiles...

[nas1m]

Sorry for asking yet another question .

I just had a look at the Bionic install folder because I have been pondering ways to increase visual variety in terms of the environments without the need for new art (mainly with regard the usability of hue shifts to create new tiles - similar to what I think you have done for TLF) and I noticed something weird:

Is it possible that a good number of the tiles in the Floors folder (as well as possibly the fog) are never used ingame? I am fairly sure I have ever seen these:

FactoryGold.png
FactoryPoisonGas.png
PipesAndGratesRed.png
as well as (possibly) some others

Maybe its just a matter of spawn rates or the amount of different environments used for a single map, though.

If this is really the case: Any chance for you to bring them back and/or increase the number of different environments used? Some color would be a relieve for my eyes, you know ...

[keith.lamothe]

Iirc there were a number of floor types that we made and then later disabled (without removing the assets) because they were hard to look at for a long time, etc.  If you think those unused varieties have potential try copying them over the normal ones and see how they look in-game and let me know how it goes

[nas1m]

Iirc there were a number of floor types that we made and then later disabled (without removing the assets) because they were hard to look at for a long time, etc.  If you think those unused varieties have potential try copying them over the normal ones and see how they look in-game and let me know how it goes

If you tell which ones are the normal ones, sure .
Any chance to make this a setting with reasonable effort? Would be more convenient that way...

[nas1m]

I just gave this a shot (and consulted the alpha release notes). Apparently all backgrounds which do not have an obvious tile based grid have been removed, so presumably:

DarkGrating
FactoryGold
PipesAndGrates1
PipesAndGrates2
PipesAndGratesRed

and maybe:
FactoryPoisonGas

While I agree that especially the PipesAndGrates ones do not look as attractive as the rest, I would prefer the increased variety and have them anyway tbh. FactoryGold and FactoryPoisonGas are definitely attractive enough to be added no matter what (in case they are missing), in my book.

If you don't want to add an UI option for this, how about using a "disabledfloortypes.txt" instead?
That would allow (people like) me to simply use an empty file.

As a related question:
Would it be possible to make the game consider all files located in the Floors folder as eligible floor tiles (if need be a specific resolution and format could be forced)? I am thinking about simply creating blueish/reddish/yellowish etc. variants of the existing files to further increase variety here...

Would this be feasible?

[keith.lamothe]

Looking in the code, I see an enum for FloorType with the following valid values:

    Factory,
    FactoryDark,
    FactoryRed,
    FactoryPoisonGas,
    MutedMachinery,
    GlassRed,
    GlassPurple,


There's also a FloorEdgeType:

    Wires,
    Pipes,
    SmallRibbed,


I could add some values to those like "Custom1", 'Custom2", etc, and thus it would recognize files by those names (I'd have it ignore those values if the corresponding files were not present) and use them.  I imagine that would handle the main use cases you have in mind.  I could also make it no longer enum-based and just read in what's there, but that would be considerably more work.

[nas1m]

I see. Adding a couple of enum values for custom maps would be totally sufficient, thanks!
Maybe roundabout ten? That should suffice for now ...

[nas1m]

I have made a few first attempts at tinkering with the existing floor assets as well as some of the icons using simple HSL/HSV manipulations and the results look rather promising - at least to me . Increasing the visual variety of the game should be feasible this way (presuming anybody else likes what I may come up with).

So I would definitely appreciate those enum values of yours -  and maybe even a couple more than ten .

I am even thinking about attempting some more sweeping changes to how the game looks by touching most of the assets.


Before I dive into any of this and actually put some work into it, I got one question, though:

Would it be okay for you/Arcen if I distribute the manipulated assets via the Arcen Forums to allow other players to patch their copy? What kind of copyright notice would I have to add?

Just asking because, if this may only ever affect me for legal reasons, I would like to know this beforehand .

[keith.lamothe]

You're welcome to basically do whatever you want with the art assets from Bionic, same as with AIW.  And it would be helpful to have any alternate assets be tried out by a fairly broad section of players so we can determine whether to incorporate them into the main game.

Glad to hear it's going well

[nas1m]

Progress !

EDIT: Mantised the enum values for custom floor tiles request here.